Mitch Joel's Blog: Six Pixels of Separation, page 168
February 21, 2017
Consumer Trust Is Not What You Think It Is These Days
What is the number one reason that a customer is loyal to a brand?
Some might think that it's all about price. If a customer can save a few dollars, they will jump that brand ship without thinking twice. Candidly, if you asked me what the number one reason might be for a customer's loyalty, I'd grapple between price and value. What would you say? This morning, eMarketer published the news item, Money Can't Buy Me Love: US Consumers Loyal to Brands They Trust. At first, I did a double take. How could a consumer say "trust" over "price" or "value"? A brand can't really earn trust until they have demonstrated fair pricing and good value, right? It all felt a little backwards. The piece went on to say...
"Consumers are loyal to brands that respect their privacy, and that demonstrate their trustworthiness by safeguarding customers' personal information... Consumers are also loyal to brands that respect their time. Roughly eight in 10 respondents said it's important that brands are there for them when needed, but otherwise want to be left alone and contacted only minimally."
Wait what?
According to this article (and a report conducted by Accenture) the number one factor that influences US Internet users' loyalty to brand is: "Being trustworthy with regard to safeguarding and respecting of my personal information." This answer scored 85%. To put this into perspective endorsements from influencers was the lowest at 23%, support and acting upon causes was 37%, personalization was 41% and gifts of thanks and acknowledgment was 69%. Price and value were not even a part of this list.
This means: A brand's online experience should not be the same as their offline experience?
How a brand builds trust (as we have traditionally defined it) may either be shifting or it's completely different when it comes to the online world. Perhaps price is not as important online as knowing that the brand is protecting your data. Would you buy from Amazon if the price was more expensive than another online retailer that you had never heard of? This is not as outlandish as it might seem, at first blush. Think about all of the major brands that have been hacked over the past few years. I'm sure that a few of them immediately come to mind. Has that eroded your trust in them? For many, this is a truism. For many, shopping online is not the same as walking into a store. The results of this report prove that a customer online looks nothing like the customer that just walked into our stores.
Imagine if a corporation had brand values that looked like this:
We promise to protect your personal data at all costs.
We promise to not spam the hell out of you, even though you gave us explicit permission to stay connected.
We promise to be better to you, the longer that you stay with us.
We promise to always give you, our current customers, the better prices.
We promise to make each experience you have with us more personalized and relevant to your needs.
We promise to always keep you on the cutting edge with the most up-to-date products in the industry.
We promise to engage with you to design more relevant experiences for you.
We promise to leave you alone most of the time.
Some do this. Most do not.
Do brands truly understand the nuanced shifts in customer expectations, and can these brands become more and more digital-first by nature? What's more relevant is to look at the language and engagement that consumers expect in these digital channels (see the article above) verses their expectations when they deal with you in your "protein forms" (as I like to call it). A truly digital-first brand - it turns out - is really about the data. Not the data that you capture. Not the data of what your customer's do on your site. It's about the customer's data. Proove to the customer that brand loyalty is really about how much care you demonstrate in protecting their data - and using their information to create a more personalized experience (without spamming them at every corner to hit your sales numbers) - and you may have just unlocked a whole new way to wins friends and influence business outcomes.
Winning customer's trust feels like something very different these days. Would you agree?
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February 20, 2017
Your Google Searches May Be Used Against You, Artificial Intelligence Gets Smarter 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:
Terry is away on vacation this week. Sitting in is Pierre Landry.
We tell things to Google that we would not even tell our spouse. Think about it. Now, think about this: how would you feel if your entire search history were to be used against you? We're not talking about hackers, but insurance, lending and health-based companies. And, that history of yours last for a lot longer than you think. The Atlantic published a scary article back in 2015 that was making the rounds again last week online titled, People's Deepest, Darkest Google Searches Are Being Used Against Them.
Artificial Intelligence (AI) is on its way. Billions are being invested. Everyone from Google to Facebook to Amazon are investing heavily. How far along are we? It turns out that new AI can write and rewrite its own code to increase its intelligence. Google's AI created its own form of encryption! Think about that for a second.
App of the Week: Tunity.
Take a listen right here...
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February 19, 2017
How To Be Happy, Awesome And Authentic With Neil Pasricha - This Week's Six Pixels Of Separation Podcast
Episode #554 of Six Pixels of Separation - The Mirum Podcast is now live and ready for you to listen to.
Sometimes, in life, you get lucky. You meet someone that you have always admired, and you become fast friends. I've been with my talent bureau for over a decade (hey Speaker's Spotlight). Each year they have a holiday party for staff, speakers and friends. I always have the best of intentions to go, but I've never been. This past December, I finally went. While standing in the darkish and loud office space, Neil Pasricha came over and introduced himself. I've known about Neil for a long while. I knew him as the hugely popular #1 bestselling author of The Book Of Awesome and The Happiness Equation. I knew him as one of the most popular TED speakers in the world. I knew him, because he used to work at Walmart in their leadership development division (and Walmart was a client of Mirum). I knew him as a very popular speaker on the topic of happiness, authenticity and living a life with meaning. Still, we never had the chance to connect - one-on-one and in our protein forms. Until now. Neil is also known for his blog (that started this all) called, 1000 Awesome Things. Now, he's focused on The Institute For Global Happiness and recently gave a brand new (and awesome) TED Talk called, How do you maximize your tiny, short life? 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 #554.
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February 17, 2017
The Data Is Watching You
Just how much data and analytics does a brand need?
We can track everything online. How is that working out for you? I believe in the power of micro-transactions (a phrase that I either created after spending time with Google's Avinash Kaushik or a concept that I completely stole from him... with proper attribution). The theory is quite simple: most brands care about the main transaction (did someone buy from them), but they spend little-to-no time analyzing and nurturing the micro-transactions (someone watched a YouTube video, signed up to a newsletter, liked your brand on Facebook, etc...). If newer analytics model tell us anything, it's which combination of these micro-transactions create the most efficient path to purchase. So, the data is not about vanity metrics (how many people did what) but true value-based metrics (was all that effort to drive consumers to our e-newsletter a smart strategy?). As more information gets pumped into these systems, brands will be able to leverage this data against second and third-party data sources to create a bunch of new marketing models... the likes of which business has never seen before. Many scoff at this idea, but Facebook is neck-deep into these models. Last December, Business Insider published the article, Facebook is quietly buying information from data brokers about its users' offline lives:
"To find out exactly what type of data Facebook buys from brokers, we downloaded a list of 29,000 categories that the site provides to ad buyers. Nearly 600 of the categories were described as being provided by third-party data brokers. (Most categories were described as being generated by clicking pages or ads on Facebook). The categories from commercial data brokers were largely financial, such as 'total liquid investable assets $1-$24,999,' 'People in households that have an estimated household income of between $100K and $125K', or even 'Individuals that are frequent transactor at lower cost department or dollar stores.'"
What certain brands know about about their consumers is scary.
It's not even a question of what they're doing with this information, it's the fact that they have all of this information. So, here's a thought: if brands know this much about their consumers, what's stopping them from knowing even more about their employees and team members? MIT Technology Review published a pretty terrifying article titled, Your Cubicle Has Ears--and Eyes, and a Brain:
"... an increasing number of companies are outfitting offices with sensors to keep track of employees. These sensors are hidden in lights, on walls, under desks -- anywhere that allows them to measure things like where people are and how much they are talking or moving. The raw data is just the beginning... software to crunch information on everything from key card swipes to what applications people are using on their computers to understand how employees -- and the business as a whole -- operate."
So, just how productive are you?
There has been monitoring technologies forever. The promise is a work environment that is more creative and productive. The other side of that coin is that your team members feel like Big Brother is not only watching them, but analyzing their every waking breath and telling them how to improve upon it. So, we've gone from optimizing the path to purchase in our marketing efforts to optimizing each and every path our employees take during the day. Layer in the promise of machine learning (a computer's ability to analyze all of these inputs, provide an insight and optimize against it without any human intervention) and then some basic artificial intelligence (let it come to and create its own conclusions without the need for the folks in HR), and it's not far-fetched to imagine how employees might be reviewed and compensated based on their "true-performance" (what the computer says), instead of just showing up and doing the work (as we have done to date). Also, imagine just how far some semi-smart technology can take this. It could know what kind of performer you are even prior to taking the job (past data sets and analytics). It could provide a real-time dashboard, showing employees if they're up for the challenge of the day or falling behind. The technology laid out in the article above isn't just about how an individual performs. It will be used to see how teams operate, which spaces get used (and which don't) and on and on.
And, just like that, we have a strange reversal of fortunes where many will beg for more data about their customers, but beg even more aggressively for their employers to know less and less about their own performance.
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Six Links Worthy Of Your Attention #348
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:
Google Maps: Hyperlapse Around the World - IDEAndo . "I'm almost at the point where I take mapping for granted. I used to have a sense of direction, and print travel instructions. We've had Google Maps for less than 15 years, and today, everyone with a smartphone and a data plan has the kind of geographic intelligence past military commanders could only dream of. One Maps fan decided to celebrate, stitching together thousands of images from Google. The hard part was removing metadata and stabilizing images, as this PetaPixel post explains." (Alistair for Hugh).
Meeting Earth's most typical person - CBS Evening News . "In an era of tailored marketing and personalization, it turns out that you can learn a lot from averages. National Geographic analyzed the data on human population, and combined nearly 200,000 faces to make a portrait to accompany the person: 'He is Han Chinese so his ethnicity is Han. He is 28 years old. He is Christian. He speaks Mandarin. He does not have a car. He does not have a bank account.' And then--plot twist--CBS News went and found him." (Alistair for Mitch).
The Rise of the Like Economy - The Ringer . "How the little thumbs up has transformed the world." (Hugh for Alistair).
Enter Sandman - Iron Horse . "Does Mitch love metal? Hell yeah. Does Mitch love bluegrass? I doubt it. But, love it or hate it, you have to take your hat off to a bluegrass cover of a Metallica classic." (Hugh for Mitch).
Automation Will Make Us Rethink What a "Job" Really Is - Harvard Business Review . "What value will a 'job' hold if we do, in fact, see the rise of intelligent automation? Famed Futurist (and co-founder of Wired), Kevin Kelly, would call this an inevitable moment. I believe him. With that, our economy is going to change as machines become intelligent. They will learn by experience and improve (with leaps and bounds) over time. These are facts (whether you want to admit it or not). So, what are we all going to do? Don't think that 'being creative' is the answer, either because that too will become automated over time. So, what's a job for?" (Mitch for Alistair).
A Conversation With Brian Eno About Ambient Music - Pitchfork . "I think that I like the way Brian Eno talks about music and creativity more than I enjoy the music that he creates... and that's saying something (love his stuff!). He is so intellectual and creatively inspiring when he speaks about his work - or the type of music that inspires him. This is a great example of that. If you feel like you might obsess a little too much over the work that you're doing, take a reads of this..." (Mitch for Hugh).
Feel free to share these links and add your picks on Twitter, Facebook, in the comments below or wherever you play.
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February 16, 2017
Is The Chief Marketing Officer A Company's Weakest Link?
Marketing has become a much more important corporate function.
There is no denying that. We live in a world where ad spending will reach close to $500 billion in 2017. Digital advertising had $17.6 billion in investment from US companies in the third quarter of 2016. 2017 will see over $75 billion in digital advertising spend. We are seeing many new competitive forces at play in the marketing services space - this includes the largest accounting and consulting firms, publishers offering services that are typically done in-house or by an agency, platforms selling marketing services and more. There is more consolidation, as the major marketing and communications holding companies continue both their acquisition and investment to growth strategies. Brands - more than ever - need strong marketing leaders, in a world where overall economic growth has been (mostly) flat (or single-digit growth) and technology, disruption and transformation are still turning markets upside down.
You would think that a company's Chief Marketing Officer would be an anchor in the c-suite and core to the brand's growth. You would be wrong.
AdAge published the news item, CMOs Have Half the Tenure of CEOs, yesterday and the results are not confidence inspiring. Here are the highlights:
A CMO who has kept their position for more than four years is above average.
CMOs have the shortest average tenure in the c-suite.
That tenure (about 4 years) is half the average tenure of CEOs.
The position is plagued with high turnover.
Marketing leadership turnover soared last year with 177 appointments in the last two quarters of last year.
2016 saw the highest turnover since the researchers started tracking it four years ago.
60% of CMOs being tracked left for a "new opportunity."
Is it all bad news for the Chief Marketing Officer and their role in the organization?
Of course not. AdAge (and the researchers) acknowledge that the CMO role is in high demand, that CMOs tend to be very diverse professionals who get promoted quickly within the organization, and that it's sometimes the organization's inability to be aligned with the transformation that marketing requires in this day and age. Still, this is a huge problem. Regardless of whether or not the CMO is leaving for all of the right reasons or being shown the door, it sets the table for a problematic situation where the brand and consumer bears the consequence of this corporate version of musical chairs. Four years is not enough of a tenure to see a brand's full opportunity blossom. Business trends move quickly, the need to implement technology for the future and secure solid metrics in the coming quarter will never be met if the average CMO is busy looking for their next gig or being cherry-picked to do something else.
Where the marketing blame game lies.
We're seeing a growing shift in agency compensation models (performance-based and/or value-based compensation models) being pushed out by brands to agencies and media partners with the attitude of wanting a true partner that is invested in the brand's output. We're seeing a marketing department that is growing in terms of internal capabilities. We're seeing a marketing department that is spending on technology as if they were the IT department. We're seeing a marketing department that is pushing the accountability of their actions over to their media and agency partners to absolve them of any outcomes that don't render positive results. All of this is fair in love and war, but it's not acceptable in a world where the brand's leader isn't even planning to see things through. It would be easy to push the blame of bad marketing between the brand and their agency partners, this is not the issue to debate, at this point. Here's what is obvious: brands will not be nurtured to their full potential when the CMO changes with such frequency. It simply can't. It's all too frenetic.
Marketing is mission critical.
We need to agree on this. Management consultant, Peter Drucker, once famously said: "Because the purpose of business is to create a customer, the business enterprise has two-and only two-basic functions: marketing and innovation." The tenure of the Chief Marketing Officer needs to increase. Dramatically. We can't simply sit on the sidelines and accept this as a "new normal." It's too easy to blame this on the new world of work, and that we can't expect these highly sought-after professionals to sit around. No. We need more leaders to embody the spirit of the job title. Being a Chief Marketing Officer makes you the ultimate steward of the brand. A role that should not be taken lightly. A role that should not be assumed without a firm commitment to see things through.
If we don't hold the Chief Marketing Officer accountable to their tenure, how can we expect to hold them accountable to the marketing budget?
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February 15, 2017
Don't Throw Good Brand Money After Bad
This article could also be called, "who says you can't go home?"
I was in Orlando this morning, presenting to the Retail Industry Leaders Association. I grabbed a coffee with an old friend, who is now running marketing for a major retailer in the United States. She was telling me how difficult their new role is, because they are busy untangling the mess that was left behind from her predecessor. It's a story that I will often be privy to, but the morale of this brand experience was so fundamentally different than the usual fare, that it made me rethink how a senior marketing professional should approach their work and the brand that they serve.
What happened before all of this?
Prior to my friend taking over, the brand decided to do a major overhaul at the same time that many of the senior leadership had either changed jobs or were moved to other parts of the organization. With that, the senior leadership felt that it would be a good time for fresh eyes on the brand and marketing. They decided on an individual that might bring a different perspective to the brand. This brand was not faltering, but - at the same time - there was market erosion and competitive forces at play (think Amazon). The brand spent significantly on marketing and would continue to. This individual came in and cleaned house - both the internal team and a full agency review. It wound up not injecting anything new, but rather making everyone scared for their own job and performance. What followed was a radical departure in everything from creative output to expectations on results and beyond. This senior marketer moved quickly. They wanted to embody the change that they were hired for. You know where this story is going. The end result was a scared internal marketing team, new agency partners that did not fully grasp the history of the brand, to a marketplace that wasn't very accepting of the new work in-market. It was all too new and too fast. There was a problem. With a strategy and timeline in place, this senior marketer was abruptly let go.
Where does a brand go from here?
This is where things got interesting. My friend could have easily reviewed the work, adjusted it, tweaked it, polished it up, and continued on the set path and strategy (which was all well done, baked, approved and ready to roll). Instead, she decided to do something dramatic. She went backwards. Backwards? Back to where the retailer was before their predecessor took over? Wasn't there a brand desire for change? Go backwards? I could hardly believe it.
"Some senior marketers don't respect the brand. They're too worried about their own image."
Upon looking at the new strategy and how it *might* unfold, my friend realized that this work was all done to make the person that they replaced look good in the market. It wasn't done in reverence of the brand, what the brand stands for and where it had to go. "I didn't want to throw good brand money after bad money," she said. "I believed that their original platform needed some reviewing and some TLC, but that it was much more aligned with what the business had to do. I don't believe in change for change's sake. I also don't believe that a brand should follow one person's vision, verses building on what the brand had become over the decades that they have been in business. I thought about the original founder. That one store that has become this large North American corporation. I thought about what their dream had become, and where that brand should be... based on many research points and conversations with customers, stakeholders, the founders' family and more. This brand was much bigger than me. This brand was much bigger than my resume. This brand was much bigger than winning some advertising and retail awards. I wanted to make a difference by helping this brand grow."
That could be the lesson, but there's more...
The brand - literally - went backwards. She pretended like the past few years never happened. If someone asked about, she accepted it as "a mistake." They started from the day before that last person started at the company. "The general sentiment was that we could never go backwards," she went on to say. "My reaction was, 'why not?' Their work did not put us in a better position. In fact, it may have hurt us. Why continue on that path? Why not go back. Why not build on the legacy, instead of trying to fix their work? The work that was done before was strong. It helped to build this brand to where it is." I left our conversation wondering how many brands would do this? How many brands would erase the past few years of their marketing? How many brands would go back and start from that point in the past and invest on rebuilding the trust? How many brands would not just try to make the best of a bad situation instead of truly correcting course? How many brands could accept the work as a mistake? I wonder.
I wonder how many brands would have the courage to do this. Would yours?
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February 14, 2017
It's Not Easy To Be A Loving Brand These Days
Be careful what you wish for.
Never has a sentiment been so true like it is for brands these day. We have never lived in a more politically-driven and open-social environment at the same time. Brands should be spinning like a top (in fact, a lot of them are). If you think back to the early days of social media, there was a commonly-held sentiment that brands came into social media kicking and screaming (for the most part). This is a fact. Yes, there were brands that embraced the ethos of The Cluetrain Manifesto, and saw social media as a fantastic way to have real interactions between real human beings, still the vast majority of big, corporate brands had to re-invent their brand philosophy to better understand what it means to connect in this social era. Many started off with blogging - and the early social media platforms - as a way to counter-balance against the many individual voices that were now asking questions, complaining and trying to connect to a brand that, clearly, never had an operating procedure for how to deal with individuals in an open and public way.
Some would say that this made companies and brands much more human... and that's a good thing, right?
In theory, this is not a good thing... it's a great thing. Social media (and the openness that it brought) truly empowered a brand's values to come alive. You could read - in their tweets - how serious they were about pleasing consumers that had been wronged, and just how interested they really were in acquiring new consumers by how they engaged and connected and answered questions. It was less about being a brand on social media and much more about how to be a brand in a community with others. On the other hand, it also became abundantly clear how many brands struggled with these marketing channels. It was (and still is) amazing to see how many brands treat these digital connection opportunities like a form of advertising or broadcasting... or a mixture of the two. Nothing more. Nothing less.
As brands connect more, are they really more human?
Here we are. Close to fifteen years since social media has become a prominent channel for a brand to connect. What we now see are brands who live (and die) by their values... and shared values with their consumers. It would be hard to argue that this is a bad thing, but it's been a strange evolution of culture, society, politics and technology lately. And, yes, it has all come to a head. In essence, a brand can be more open and transparent, and still be a victim to outside sources that would have them scurrying back to the times when a brand was something you bought... and not something that you engaged/connected with as a consumer. In the past short while, we've seen a major automobile brand shocked to find out that an investigation in the UK revealed it was funding terrorists organizations, because their ads were being shown on extremist's online channels. The issue was an unintended consequence of their programmatic/algorithmic technology. We've seen a major e-commerce platform fight with consumers and employees because a right-wing media organization purchased their platform to sell merchandise on. We've seen a highly-respected Silicon Valley innovator dismiss themselves from the U.S. President's business advisory council, after consumers started a movement to delete their app. We've seen a major fashion retailer take it from all sides, because they stopped carrying the fashion line of the U.S. President's daughter. We've even seen one of the world's top YouTuber's (one that brand's loved to attach on to) lose their entire revenue stream after posting racist content. We have seen more than this. There is much more to come.
Maybe Howard Stern got it right?
In 2012, a major fast food chain came under fire, because one of their leaders took a position against same-sex marriage. While the brand was known to maintain highly-religious and traditional values, it lit the world up. I distinctly remember listening to Howard Stern talk up the subject, and he summarized it perfectly. He said (and, I'm paraphrasing here): "why don't they shut up and just sell chicken?"
Can brands still be human without getting tangled in these sensitive, political, cultural and religious issues?
Last month, I posted an article titled, Be More Human Without Being Too Personal To Build Your Brand. The crux of this post was that you can be a very personable brand (either a corporate or a personal one) without being too personal. It's not the only way, but brands are willingly (and unwillingly) being pulled into these social media, traditional media and public battles, that are driven by a customer's values and how they may oppose those of the brands. It's interesting: the consumer now believes that it's not about what you sell and the price of it, but what you stand for. Brands are being pulled into battles, because their ads have inadvertently been tied to a bad situation. What's unique now, is that the brand response is no longer binary. In today's environment, brands that have quickly/swiftly removed themselves from the situation have often not been applauded, but hurt more for bending and cowering to another side. Brands that have pointed the blame elsewhere (like, say, blame the technology) have been bashed for being so out of touch with how business works these days. Brands that have distanced themselves from influencers that have run amok, are still accused of using them for when it works for the brand, but bailing on them when times get tough (meaning: not authentic). And more.
It's a slippery slope.
Many businesses professionals believe in having a more holistic approach to crisis management (start developing strategies and scenarios, and have dark posts ready based on a myriad of situations). Still, with the current climate, it's hard to figure out what the course of action should be. What are we really seeing? It feels like a world where consumers want brands to be more personal. They wants brands to be open and to stand for something, but when something goes awry (and it always does), the pitchforks are out. Consumers seem to not be forgiving, in the same way that they might be with a family member or friend. In turn, the brands aren't really accepting responsibility, so much as pointing the finger at something else, laying blame elsewhere and excusing themselves with a caveat.
A Valentine's Day Lesson.
It is Valentine's Day (I love you all :)... and anybody in a substantive relationship knows that the only thing more powerful than "I love you," is "I'm sorry." And yes, there is a period after that "I'm sorry," because adding anything else negates the apology. "I'm sorry, but..." "I'm sorry, and..." "If you want me to apologize, I will..." and on and on are not apologies. So, here's the loving message for a brand today: if you get stuck (and it looks like you will, in an unwittingly way), try "sorry." No caveats.
Wondering if that's even enough these days?
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February 13, 2017
The Trouble With Twitter, Flying Uber Cars 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:
Does Wall Street's attitude not meet the realities of the marketplace? Is Twitter dying? That's what Wall Street would lead us to believe. If you dig in, you will see that shares have dropped more than 10% as ad revenue fell by 7%. With that, its monthly user base increased 4% to 319 million, and daily users were up 11%. Still the money is not following (this is the headline), as revenue grew only 1%. So, close to 320 million people use this platform. There is still - without a doubt - many people who know, like and use it. There is still - without a doubt - many people who might still join or use it for different reasons (Facebook is getting close to 2 billion users, so the market is open). There is still - without a doubt - things that Twitter can do (more than text, different marketing solutions, premium services, data and analytics plays, etc...). If you abide by the Wall Street world (massive growth, multiples and huge ad revenue), it looks like Twitter is in a death spiral. If you abide by a different philosophy (large media platform, strong user base, strong technology, a part of our cultural fabric, etc...), it's a relevant business that is not growing at the speed of Wall Street's expectations. Twitter is not dying. It's just not living up to Wall Street hype. Those are two different things. I wrote more about it here: Don't Confuse Growth From Relevance.
Whenever we talk about self-driving cars, I think about how quickly they came to market... and how fast it is still happening. Well, without missing a beat, Uber hired a NASA Langley Research Center engineer named, Mark Moore. Moore became (somewhat) known in the engineering world for his research into VTOL (short for Vertical Takeoff and Landing). Yes... flying cars. Uber launched Uber Elevate last year. Many thought it was a stunt. Now, it seems more like something that is inevitable. If drones take hold. Why not drones that can transport us humans?
Montreal startup, Luxury Retreats, made the news at the end of last week, because it looks like Airbnb is about to acquire them for close to $300 million USD. A huge win and a story of great entrepreneurship that Montreal should be very proud of!
App of the week: FaceApp.
Take a listen right here.
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February 12, 2017
Reinvent Yourself With James Altucher - This Week's Six Pixels Of Separation Podcast
Episode #553 of Six Pixels of Separation - The Mirum Podcast is now live and ready for you to listen to.
James Altucher is one of the best non-fiction writers that I know. He writes quality. He writes quantity. He has a lot of material. He is a trader, investor, writer, and entrepreneur. His bio is an impressive one. He was an investor in Buddy Media (which sold to Salesforce for about $800 million) as well as bitly. His latest book is called, Reinvent Yourself, and it's a great read. He's written over 15 other books (most of them are bestsellers). He has a podcast that is insanely popular called, The James Altucher Show. Also, if you're not following his writing, The Altucher Confidential, you don't know what you're missing. Last years, James sold everything he had in New York City and became a true digital nomad and minimalist. He's got some opinions on a lot of different topics. 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 #553.
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