Mitch Joel's Blog: Six Pixels of Separation, page 172

Six Links Worthy Of Your Attention #343

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 (BitCurrent, Year One Labs, GigaOM, Human 2.0, Solve For Interesting, the author of Complete Web Monitoring, Managing Bandwidth: Deploying QOS in Enterprise Networks and Lean Analytics), 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: 

Dronestagram . "I learned about this social network for drone photos via The Washington Post. As cheap footage from anywhere becomes ubiquitous, we'll see the world in new ways (and have fewer secrets to hide)." (Alistair for Hugh).
Whirlwind POV Tokyo tour with BMXer Nigel Sylvester - BoingBoing . "I want to have this guy's balance and travel schedule for a few days. Talk about a frenetic way to see a city. I'm also encountering this first-person popup view in the wild more and more, possibly an outgrowth of Twitch and VR. Watch it in full-screen with the sound up." (Alistair for Mitch).
Quantifying the Cost of Sprawl - The Atlantic's CityLab . "I'm a little bit skeptical of some of the units used to compare things here (is tax revenue/acre a useful number?). Still, the more data we can get, the better our decisions ought to be... and sprawl vs. compact development seems like a critical urban planning/policy issue for the coming years." (Hugh for Alistair).
Republicans want to fight climate change, but fossil-fuel bullies won't let them - The Washington Post . "OK, so this isn't about Trump, exactly, so I'm not sending a link about Trump, OK? But, climate change is probably humanity's greatest threat (or nukes are, I'm not sure). But anyway, turns out all those policymakers who don't believe in the science of climate change, actually do believe in the science of climate change, they just can't say anything about it." (Hugh for Mitch).  
CES 2017: The Dawn Of The Third Connected Era - MediaPost . "One of the most underrated thinkers when it comes to advertising, marketing and technology is Rishad Tobaccowala. If you're in the advertising agency business, you should know who he is. If you're in business, you should pay attention to him. He's one of the senior leaders at Publicis. More importantly, he knows (better than most) how to take disruption, technology and business and codify it so that we can all think and grow with more clarity. Here's his take on CES." (Mitch for Alistair).
Moby Lets You Download 4 Hours of Ambient Music to Help You Sleep, Meditate, Do Yoga & Not Panic - Open Culture . "Hugh, please. For the sake of everyone. It's enough with the politics. Deep breaths. Deeper sleeps. Calm. Control. And, yes, I may be projecting here. This has been downloaded." (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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7 Steps To Define Your Content Center Of Excellence

"You're that social media guy, right?"

I get that. The branding guy. The marketing guy. The tech guy. The media guy. The writer guy. The business book guy. The speaking guy. Depending on how people interface with me (and my content), my branding may vary. I may not love all of those titles, but it's a great insight into both how the world sees me (thanks for that, Sally Hogshead) and how they connect with the work that I do. With that, when asked what I do, it's easy to say that I "run a digital marketing agency called Mirum." It's easy to tell people that I am a writer, or a speaker. For me, it can be situational, and I'm not all that fussy about it, because it's all accurate. Many brands are focused on the one thing (and that can be important for an organization to find its differentiation). Of course, it is important to figure out the one thing that you do better than anyone else.  

That one thing is actually created by figuring out how many things intersect.

Here's my simple and fast process that I use to figure out what a true center of excellence is for content. Why do this? Focus. I want to ensure that whatever messaging that I produce, publish and promote ties back (as closely as possible) to my center of excellence.

Use this quick 7-step methodology to build your own centre of excellence:

Step #1: The Tactic. My tactic of primary output is content. Yours might be advertising, word of mouth referrals, networking, database marketing, etc... You don't have to stick with just one. Obviously, I deploy all tactics to grow the brand. Choosing a primary tactic gives focus. Content works for me, personally, because of my background in writing, journalism, media and communications.
Step #2: The Format. My format is text and audio. You can choose just one. And, truthfully, my "one" would be text, but I do find myself producing more and more audio content. We live in a world where anyone can have an idea and share it - in text, images, audio and video - and distribute it - for free - to the world. This can be long-form, short-form, live/streaming or produced. This can be highly-produced or more off the cuff. My format of choice is long-form text (articles, business books, etc...) and long-form audio (a weekly podcast).
Step #3: The Frequency. My frequency is daily for text and weekly for audio. I don't recommend such a frenetic pace, but I do recommend setting up a regular schedule, and doing everything in your power to stick with it. This is often the most highly-overlooked and mistreated part of the process. When brands fail at content, it's usually because they have not figured out a groove and flow, and consumers don't make the connection. Prior to the Internet, I was a much more voracious consumer of print magazines (had to be, there wasn't the selection that we have today online). I would often go to the corner store, and I could "feel" when the latest issue of Fast Company was due. It just "felt" like it had been about four weeks since the last issue. I often get feedback when the Six Pixels of Separation Podcast is published later in the day on Sunday. My listeners know that it's published early Sunday morning. When it's not there, they feel the gap and this weakens the brand. Frequency will not only keep you on schedule, it will be core to the brand experience. 
Step #4: The Triangle of Attention. Visualize (or, better yet, draw) a triangle. For every point on the triangle choose one area of interest. My three areas of attention are: 1. Brands. 2. Consumers. 3. Technology. What does this mean? I will not produce, share or promote any content that doesn't (in some way) speak to all (or some) of these areas of attention. It can be only one area (even an idea that is loosely related to just one area), but the more points of the triangle that your content taps into, the more focused it will be. Choosing those three words is not as easy as it looks. If you're not sure how to get started on this exercise, please listen to my conversation with Mark Levy about freewriting, list-making and his amazing book, Accidental Genius. I promise you, within a few minutes of studying his simple process, you will be rock and rolling. Take a listen here: SPOS #221 - Unlocking Creativity And Your Accidental Genius With Mark Levy. 
Step #5: The Bullseye. My bullseye is "marketing." Once you have your triangle defined (see step #4), now you have to figure out what the, exact intersection is of those attention points. For me, what pulls it all together is how does marketing affect, change and touch the areas of brands, consumers and technology. Again, this may read a simplistic, but it's not. If, at the centre, of my content there is not the notion of how this affects the product, price, promotion and place (those classic Four Ps of marketing), I probably won't publish the content. The bullseye is what pulls everything together. For you and for me (as your consumer).
Step #6: The Promoter. How do you get your message to spread. Thankfully, I've been able to build (over 15 years) a significant social media following. With that, I've had the fortune of being a two-time published business book author, an in-demand public speaker, I have a regular radio stint and write for several other publications (print and online). In short, I have many outlets and opportunities to promote my thinking. How will you get your message to catch on? What paid and organic media opportunities will you take advantage of? Many well-respected content producers tell me that they spend five hours of promoting their content for every hour of content that they produce. "Build it and they will come," is not a promotion strategy. This doesn't have to be a broad list of opportunities. Be very specific and go after it.    
Step #7: The Analysis And Adjustment Bureau. Use your analytics (most packages are free) to better understand what is working, where it's working and how it is working. Think about how often you will use these tools, to not only better understand your audience, but to then adjust and tweak your content to make it connect in a more effective way.

Seven steps. But that's not all.

The idea here was to provide you with a very simplistic way to better understand your "why" (as Simon Sinek, would say) and how you are going to get your content to connect with the world, which is not as easy as it used to be. By following this process, and doing the work (as Steven Pressfield would say), you will find your voice - a groove to the content flow - and better understand how to be unique in world where so many brands are just riding the coattails of others... and not gaining any significant market advantage by doing so. 

Stick with it, because it takes time. Focus on The Triangle of Attention and hit that bullseye. 

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Quality And Speed Don't Have To Collide

"Those are all great ideas, but we need something in market fast."

It's the toughest part of the conversation, when you're in the marketing agency business. It's not a question of quality ideas over time, it's the erosion of the relationship and the business opportunity that this one sentence fosters. Candidly, when lines like this start being thrown around in conversations, it is the beginning of the end. And, how it affects the quality of the work is only the beginning. Being fast is important. Being fast is smart.

Still, being fast can be a lot worse than good. And the two are not diametrically opposed.

When work is done with this type of direction, a marketing agency simply can't win. The client is pushing something through due to internal pressures. The process then becomes strained. The conversations and work is not looked at in terms of market efficacy, but rather how quickly it can get reviewed and approved internally. The agency might get lucky. The work might take. More often than not, it fails. Then, on the brand side, management wants to know what happened, and the agency is blamed for sub-par work. That's the internal business side. Externally, more bad work is in market, and the work doesn't help the brand sell more goods and services. The internal brand team will lay blame on the agency output of the work, and not on the process that drove it. In the end, it's bad... all around. 

Fast doesn't have to be "me too."

One of the key lessons that I have seen - time and time again - after close to two decades in the agency business is that the preliminary ideas are, typically, "me too" ideas. Brands are trying to keep pace - or be seen in the same vein - as their competitors, so they are responding (speed) with something (not an original idea). This "let's just get it done and figure out how to improve on it later on," may "feel" right in the moment, but it never takes. It never takes, because the speed of the "me too" campaign doesn't work, and nobody wants to throw good money after bad money. It's bad business. And, someone needs to take the fall for the failure (that's usually the agency partner). 

Quality and speed don't have to collide.

The other issue, is that there is often an misconception that one idea might take longer to manifest and execute on. This is particularly true when one side already has a loosely thought-out idea in place (i.e.: "let's do what Nike did, but our way."). There are so many moving parts in the brand and agency relationship. It's easy to make statements like the one above with broad strokes. Of course, this isn't always the case. Of course, there are many more instances of great and mutually respecting partnerships. Still, this idea of doing something simply and quickly (a lesson that has been driven by senior leadership after studying the way of Silicon Valley) may not realistically apply to the marketing industry. Yes, the idea of a MVP (minimal viable product) can help ideas move from prototype to marketplace with amazing speed. Yes, this idea can help brands get a sense of market acceptance, consumer needs and the general excitement about a new product or service. Still, I'm willing to question that methodology when it's applied to a marketing platform and campaign. Consumers won't - necessarily - be able to get beyond a bad brand impression or brand experience with the thinking that the execution was a MVP, and it will improve on the next go-around. Too many brand leaders confuse a marketing campaign with a new product or service. They are not the same thing.

Do things fast. Do things well. Don't sacrifice one for the other.

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The Interoperability Of Things (And Brands)

What makes a product or service really work?

For years, you could only text message someone who was on the same carrier. For years, there were MP3 players that required a whole bunch of hardware and multiple software solutions to make everything work. Currently, if you want to see the true Internet of Things in action (home automation, etc...) it takes many different kinds of hardwares, softwares and hacks to pull it all together. In short: if it's confusing, hard and challenging, you may get the early adopters (and hackers) to play along, but mass appeal can seem like eons away.

This is also the current situation for virtual and augmented reality.

Many people (wrongly) assume that all of this is akin to the VHS or Beta wars. Which big platform will win? It's not. Both video platforms were easy to buy, install, use and integrate with your daily life. Apple didn't need to invent to the MP3 player, but the iPod was (without question) easy to buy, install, use and integrate with your daily life. Once text messages became cross-carrier (in Canada), usage exploded. Look at most technologies. In the early days of home computers, they were bought in pieces - by multiple hardware vendors - and required (serious) technical skill to install and work. Now, take someone with no computer literacy and give them an iPad. It takes no time for them to be up and running. iPads don't even have instruction manuals. It's easy to think that mass technology adoption is strictly related to the price point. It's true that new technology always has a high price barrier that makes it restrictive to a lot of people. Still, we do know that price is not usually the thing that keeps people away (remember the long lines of people looking to buy a $900 iPhone?). Think about the luxury goods or culture-based fashion brands. People will pay a premium for brands. At the end of last year, Technology Review published the article, Behind the Numbers of Virtual Reality's Sluggish Debut:

"The numbers do not exactly tell the story of a hot new consumer technology debut. By the end of 2016, 800,000 PlayStation VR units were expected to have sold, according to the research firm Canalys, along with about 500,000 HTC Vive and 400,000 Oculus Rift headsets. By comparison, Apple sold 3.3 million iPhones during the six months they were available in 2007 (the phone's debut year), according to Gartner. Sales rose to 11.4 million in 2008."

Maybe it is too early. Maybe it is not too early.

When a technology (or a product or a service) hits that Gladwellian Tipping Point, it's not due to a price break. I would argue that if you are in the business of a new technology, product or service (or trying to reinvigorate one that has been sluggish in market), think about the true interoperability of it. Think about virtual reality, augmented reality and the Internet of Things. Regardless of price point, I would argue that if the technology had seamless interoperability (meaning that it works effortlessly on currently adopted platforms and applications) that the usage would sore. Of course, it's no surprise that the Internet of Things, AR and VR felt a little muted at this passed week's big CES show in Vegas. Of course, it's no surprise that the big winner was Amazon's Alexa. Voice is something that easily and obviously connects and integrates with the platforms that most people are currently using. Voice will win the day. With that, we should not dismiss VR, AR, the Internet of Things and other technologies just because they're not barn-burning hot out of the gate. Watch and see what Facebook does to integrate their VR platform (Oculus) within the current Facebook experience. Watch that space, precisely, to see how powerful the interoperability must be for a brand to really find momentum and lift. The closer Facebook gets their newsfeed to Oculus, the quicker we will see VR adoption.  

There is a huge lesson for all brands here.

If your brand is new. If your brand is struggling. If your brand needs some new life injected into it, don't just look at a redesign or how to make it easier for a consumer to buy from you. Look to the lessons from technology. Look at this concept of interoperability, and asks yourself (and your teams) just how interoperable your brand is within your consumer's experience (or ecosystem). Think about how technology now spends millions (billions) on the business of APIs. You don't have to be a technologist to understand the world of APIs. An API (Application Program Interface) is a set of routines and tools for making software applications. An API tells software pieces how they should interact. Can your brand build a new kind of physical (product or service-based) based on the API concept, to make it easier for consumers to use your goods? Can your brand build a new kind of physical API to make it work better with the tools, services and experiences that your customers already have? Use the API as a metaphor. What more can we do to make our brand be fully-interoperable for our consumer's experience?

Modern brand imperative: Make your brand as interoperable as possible. Think about what an API for your business might look like.

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A More Elegant Question About The Future Of Retail

2017 is starting out with some ugly news on the retail front.

Admittedly, it was a strange moment for me. On the one hand, there were many disturbing pieces of news on the retail front, about department store giants Sears and Macy's. On the other hand, I spent time at many large retail spaces in Florida over the Holiday season, and could not believe the amount people, line-ups, difficulty in finding parking and general happiness of crowds that the local shopping malls, some big box retailers and even some massive outlet campuses were experiencing. I'm no fan of the "Market Of One", but it was hard to not be perplexed by these two divergent experiences that were happening at the same time. 

Let's get up to retail speed with some of the news via Business Insider:

A giant wave of store closures is about to hit the US.
Macy's is closing 100 stores - here's where they will likely shut down.
Inside Sears' death spiral: How an iconic American brand has been driven to the edge of bankruptcy.
Plus you can grab their free retail report: The Future Of Retail 2016.

Go ahead, take a look at those links... I will wait for you.

Everyone wants to know what is happening. Many will blame digital transformation, the growth of e-commerce and even directly point the finger at Amazon. It's not about that. It's about access. Access is an important concept that many of these brick and mortar retailers are not thinking about. Worse, they're probably taking it for granted, because they had it for so long. What purpose did these massive retailers provide, as they paved over (and through) the mom and pop shops that lined Main Street in the average American city as our civilization evolved? These big brands came in and offered a larger selection of products at a cheaper price. Because of their size, they were able to negotiate more powerful real estate deals, price push on their suppliers, and develop more intricate supply chain logistics. In short, they enabled consumers to have access to more products at cheaper prices.

Online commerce destroys that. Period. End of sentence.

If you spend some time with that Business Insider The Future Of Retail 2016 report, you will see one thing: while e-commerce is still very small, in relation to in-store retail, nearly all growth in the retail industry is coming from online sales. More access, more variances in pricing and more. That "more" also happens to be an ever-growing digital consumer.

So, what is the new "access"... and why should your brand care? 

Whether you're a retailer or not, you need to understand what these consumers are now looking for. They do not go to a shopping mall, an outlet complex or a big box store for access to products and prices. They can - in effect - get that anywhere (and this includes online... and on their smartphones). The new "access" is service, convenience and experience. In my "market of one" holiday shopping experience, people weren't strolling through the mall looking for the best price. People were there to have an experience. To be around other people. To show off their clothes... whatever. When they were shopping, they were not looking forward to long lines at the cash. When they were shopping, there were looking for better service (something that is non-existent - for the most part - online) and, because they were at the physical store, convenience (meaning: "how easy is this retailer making it for me to buy it now, instead of buying this stuff on my iPhone, and having it show up at my house, so I don't have to carry it around with me now?"). 

Brands needs to think more about creating this "access" for their consumers (whether they are retailers or not).

Price and selection have become a commodity, because of the online channel and globalization of business and access to information. Look at the state of retail. Think about your brand. What is your brand experience like? How golden is your service? How convenient is it to work with you? Nothing truly new here, that you would not learn from any brand leadership business book from the past few decades, but still it's a visceral experience to see it happen in action at the mall. While Macy's (and others) let go of staff and cut the experience at their physical stores, what will they do to circumvent that experience in the stores that are left... and their online experience... and for the sake of their brand? Perhaps the more elegant question about the future of retail, is a more elegant question that all brands need to ask...

How well does your brand define and provide "access" to your consumers?

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Beyond Advertising With Catharine Hays - This Week's Six Pixels Of Separation Podcast

Episode #548 of Six Pixels of Separation - The Mirum Podcast is now live and ready for you to listen to.

What comes after advertising? Is there anything after advertising? How will a $500-plus billion dollar a year industry evolve? This is the question that Catharine Hays (along with her co-author, Jerry Wind) tried to tackle in their book, Beyond Advertising - Creating Value Through All Customer Touchpoints. Catharine is the founding Director of the Future of Advertising Program at the Wharton School. The program is trying to bridge the academic and real world to create a better advertising environment. Don't let that fool you, Catharine held many positions in B2B marketing at AT&T for over a decade. So, is there a future beyond advertising? 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 #548.

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yoram wind

Find Your Brand's Content Marketing Groove

You have to know who your content resonates with.

When you know this, you need to burrow deep and keep delivering. This is why content marketing will continue to struggle for brands. Brands are being sold a false bill of goods. Brands believe that the more content they produce, the more people that it will connect with... and it will grow from there. There's an old adage that took hold in the early days of social media that seems to have been lost on those that have twisted these digital publishing platforms to act like more traditional media. Now, it's all about how many likes, shares and new eyeballs this stuff gets. Back then, it was all about "who" not "how many" people your content was connecting with. If you really want to better understand how social media became a paid channel, that's where to start. Look at the transition in social media from the "who" model to a "how many."

The paradox of growth. 

Growth and audience is a drug. Once you have a taste, it becomes an addiction. Chasing that dragon leads many to a place where their work no longer resonates. Trying to appeal to more and more people - in broader and different arenas - usually leads us to a place where trying to appeal to everybody makes it appealing to nobody. The magic of these digital and social channels was that I was (finally) able to uncover, build and connect with an audience that had a specific interest in how brands were going to transform because of technology. When I first started publishing about this intersection (2003-ish), I thought I was one of a very small and nerdy group. As Six Pixels of Separation started to take hold, it became clear that all of us (the creators and the consumers) were finally finding our tribes. Now, a list of the top 20 marketing podcasts can come out, and Six Pixels of Separation won't even make the cut. Does that hurt my feelings? Sure it does. But, it also makes me smile to see just how much this niche has evolved. Every year that I attend HubSpot's Inbound event, I look around and marvel at the tens of thousand of people in attendance. I then think back to how these events used to be held in a small hotel ballroom with a few hundred attendees, not all that long ago.

When you focus on the niche, you can still find a mass audience. 

Yesterday, we published episode #25 of Groove - The No Treble podcast. This podcast is about as niche as you can get. Once a month, I do a Six Pixels of Separation Podcast-like long-form conversation with some of the world's most respected bass players. Now entering into its third year, this passion project of mine's goal is to build the largest oral history of electric bass players. While the content is niche, there is still a lot of content about these celebrities available in other media formats. Our content and format is very different, and it's working. Why Groove? Most of the content about these musicians revolves around gear, playing techniques, and more technical chatter. For me, bassists are creative artists with stories to tell... stories that have not been told. It's a small but mighty form of content delivered by audio podcast. It is laser-focused, and it's not looking for a viral hit. Slowly - over time - and through consistently building it, it is gaining in listenership, industry respect and finding a groove of its own. 

Finding your groove. Finding your audience. 

What makes episode #25 of Groove - The No Treble Podcast so interesting for me, is how this show brings my worlds of brands connecting through technology and this kind of music together. Have you ever heard of Zander Zon? Even if you don't know his music, he should be studied by all business professionals who are thinking about how to make their own content connect. Zander has used YouTube in a very fascinating way. Not just to showcase his draw-dropping talent, but by understanding his audience and delivering against it. 

Follow Zander Zon. Make your brand like Zander Zon. 

Zander has close to 60,000 subscribers on YouTube. That's impressive for any solo bass player. What's even more impressive is that Zander's videos have generated well over 8 million views. The U.S. born (but London-based) artist has become known for his original bass compositions, but even more better known for his solo bass covers of film soundtracks, video game themes, rock songs, pop tunes and classical compositions. His Star Wars Medley and covers of songs like Adele's 'Someone Like You' and Disney Frozen's 'Let It Go', regularly get close to half-a-million views each. In fact, the Star Wars Medley reached six million views in five days. He leverages the type of content his audience seems to thrive on (unique, fun and quirky covers) to get them to check out his own, original, work. Re-read that last sentence. It's a huge lesson for brands, who tend to do little more than shill their own wares as much as possible. This popularity has allowed Zander to record and release two solo albums - Sonorous (2010) and Saturn Return (2013).

Listen to Zander's, find your brand's groove and dig in deep... Groove - Episode #25 - Zander Zon.

<a href="http://notreble.bandcamp.com/track/gr..." data-mce-href="http://notreble.bandcamp.com/track/gr... - Episode #25: Zander Zon by No Treble</a>

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Smart Brands Will Create Their Own Digital Products And Services

Marketing is so much more than advertising.

One of the bigger ideas (and evolutions) in marketing that I covered in my second business book, CTRL ALT Delete (which was published in 2013), was the idea of utilitarianism marketing. The fact is that marketing dollars don't have to (only) go to advertising. Now - because of digital - all brands have the ability to develop and create real and functional tools for their consumers. Yes, these can be apps. Yes, these can be publications. The greater thought here, was that brands are in the nascent days of being able to create and sell digital products and services to better market themselves, and better connect themselves with consumers. 

The original thought.

Let's say you're a retailer. Let's say that you've embraced e-commerce. The models are still similar. Whatever you could buy in the store, you can now shop online. This is great. This is profound. This is (still) the future. Now - more than ever - most businesses (small, medium, large, B2B and B2C) need some kind of e-commerce strategy in place (even if it's simply ordering, instead of purchasing). With that, if you are a retailer - and you have put some kind of digital commerce model in place - why would you not start developing and selling adjunct digital products and services? Macy's is still selling you physical goods online. What if they had some kind of great digital fashion app? What if they provided a Netflix-like model for certain types of valuable content? Fine, these may not be the best ideas, but the point is salient. The opportunity is clear.

Consumers - more than ever - are buying digital products and services. 

How many new devices do you think were purchased and gifted over the last holiday season? Computers, smartphones, tablets, gaming consoles, wearables and more. There's a reason why some of the more popular posts in places like cnet and Business Insider are articles with titles like, "The 20 Must-Have Apps For Your New iPhone." This is, precisely, what consumers are looking for. The timing could not be more perfect for brands to have (some kind of) digital products and services in place. 

Amazon is a model of excellence.

Without missing a beat, Amazon created their own, exclusive holiday sales event on December 30th called, Amazon Digital Day. Black Friday, Cyber Monday and now... Digital Day? Why not attempt to recreate the enthusiasm that comes with these super-special commerce events for only digital products? Amazon wound up discounting over one thousand digital items. It's not only a great way to encourage post-holiday spending, it's the type of sale that doesn't need to stress over inventory (it's unlimited!), fulfillment (the servers need to stay up, while the humans and robots can take a break from picking and packing) and more. Consumers got a whole bunch of new devices, so now they can fill them up with not only apps, games, movies, programs and music, but also digital subscriptions to online media properties... on the cheap. This was a brilliant play for Amazon and a sign of what's to come at retail and for brands.   

So smart. So ready for other brands to replicate.

The challenge, of course, is that most brands are still struggling with how to make their digital experience more aligned with consumer's current expectations (native, mobile-first). It's not just about having a responsive experience anymore. Consumers are used to swiping right and flicking their thumbs to get what they want. The opportunity seems boundless. Brands need to study what Amazon did by developing Digital Day, and they need to unpack and experiment with digital models for themselves. No, most brands won't be able to hold their own Digital Day, but the thinking needs to be done. If I were leading a brand, I would start here: what could our brand create that could be sold on a day like Digital Day? 

Start there. Start digital-first.

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Six Links Worthy Of Your Attention #342

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 (BitCurrent, Year One Labs, GigaOM, Human 2.0, Solve For Interesting, the author of Complete Web Monitoring, Managing Bandwidth: Deploying QOS in Enterprise Networks and Lean Analytics), 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: 

Future List - The Information. "Jessica Lessin's The Information may become the gift I give myself this holiday season. They've worked out the fine balance between private analyst firm and shareable newsletter. And they do great stuff -- like this (not blocked) interactive listing of the most forward-thinking VC firms. Good in part because of its criteria and visualization." (Alistair for Hugh).
10 Hot Consumer Trends - Ericsson . "This is a decent roundup of the tech that will consume us in the coming year. The short version? Ubiquitous sensing, backed by AI that works on behalf of consumers rather than on them, and a merging of physical and virtual worlds. Breathlessly hyped, or chasm-crossing good? I guess we have a year to find out." (Alistair for Mitch).
World War Three, By Mistake - The New Yorker . "I need to start reading some more cheery things, but in the meantime: here's an article about how close we've been to nuclear annihilation, and how we're probably closer than ever now. Happy New Year!" (Hugh for Alistair).
Nobel Prize-Winning Economist, Joseph Stiglitz, Explains The Key Factor That's Tearing Europe Apart - Inc. "Very clear overview of the (shockingly) simple economic forces that are pulling apart the European Union and its common currency." (Hugh for Mitch).
How Video Games Satisfy Basic Human Needs - Nautilus . "And you thought it was all fun and games! I read this article, and realized that my jaw needed to be lifted up off of the floor on multiple occasions. In short: it's not about the video game... it's about being who we truly are. Yes, video games help us to fulfill our most basic of human needs. Powerful stuff." (Mitch for Alistair).
Dirty Money - Scientific American . "Is money making you sick? I'm not talking about a lack of it... I am talking about whatever cash you are carrying around in your wallet. What if I told you that money is quickly becoming a public health hazard. Would you believe me? Well, it's a huge/global pandemic. Let's go cashless, shall we?" (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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 wpp

The Medium Is/Is Not The Message

Finding the right place to get your content to resonate has never been easier.

Still, finding the right place for your content to resonate has never been harder. Let's go back. Let's go way back. In the late eighties, I was a journalist (though, I always preferred the title "music writer", I felt that the title of "journalist" was a little too pompous for the work that I was doing). This was long before connectivity, as it is today. Fax machines were still nascent and hardly being used by publishers, journalists and companies. Pitching stories to be published was a brutal affair of rejection. In fact being rejected was welcomed, compared to the usual radio silence. Pitching a story back then was the social equivalent to being ghosted these days. Just nothing back. When social media took hold - the early days of Blogger and Movable Type - it changed everything for me. The ability to use one of these online publishing platforms was - in the purest sense of the word - transformational. I could write, edit and publish my ideas (in text, images, audio and video) for free, to the world. Yes, literally "the world." My content could reach everyone online, by simply publishing it. No more gatekeepers (as Seth Godin calls them), no more editors deciding which articles go where (and how long/what it should say). This was long before anybody really understood the power of viral content, and just how connected and shareable great content could be.

Now, it's close to 20 years later and blogging is nothing more than publishing. 

The unique qualifiers that made something a blog post over an article is gone. Blogs used to be different because they were personalized (like an online journal), on a blog platform, RSS feeds, comments, etc... Now, there is nothing that distinguishes a blog post from an article these days. That's fine. One of the true innovators of publishing is Ev Williams. Ev was behind that first Blogger platform. He then went on to help launch Twitter. If that were not enough, he then launched Medium. For years, Medium bounced around with what it was. For me, Medium always felt like a more independent Huffington Post. You could leverage the growing Medium brand, without investing in your own publishing platform, and the Medium brand didn't have a political slant or a brand that over-shadowed that of the writer's. 

More recently, Medium became more and more exciting. 

As a writer, I am constantly looking for places to publish. Recently, the growth, tools and sharing capabilities made Medium a formidable platform. It was - almost - like having your own publishing platform, while leveraging a bigger brand, and the readership of other - more established - writers. It became clear that posts on Medium got more traction, attention, readership and reaction than the articles posted on a standalone blog (like Six Pixels of Separation). Medium seemed like one of the better places to publish your words. 

Now, Ev and the Medium team are rethinking the platform. 

It's not because the content is strained. If anything, the quality and value of the content on Medium has only increased, and become more interesting (if you don't believe me, you should sign up and get their e-newsletter. It is filled with really smart voices). Today, for Medium, the problem seems to be the business model. It's the trouble with publishing today. No matter what forms of content monetization the team at Medium has tried, nothing has really worked and - with what has worked - it didn't seem like a long-term strategy. In short: the content is working great, but the advertising is not. 

The real problem with publishing. 

People often comment that the trouble with newspapers was that they did not digitize fast enough and/or they gave the digital content away for free. This created an environment where consumers would not be willing to pay for content in the future (like, today). Or, if consumers would pay for content, it would be digital pennies for the paper dollars of the past. Still, here is Ev Williams - true Silicon Valley royalty and an innovator - that has proven - multiple times - that he not only understands publishing in a digital world, but how to scale it. He too is struggling, because the ad model is both not clear and not effective (more on that here: Display Advertising Is A Failed State). In short: the advertising model is broken. It has shifted from one of scarcity and timing to abundance and constant availability.

Why we all need to watch the current state of Medium. 

Pay attention, fellow business professionals. Medium is now going to be a public and live case study in publishing, journalism, new media, revenue models and advertising. Native advertising and promoted content have proven to be a failed state for Medium (hard to execute and scale). Display advertising and targeted messaging have not worked, either. So, how do publishers capitalize? Those who think that the answer is simply having great content, or content that works have not been paying attention. Content marketers will tell you that great content wins. They're not paying close enough attention. Some of the best content is happening - right now - on Medium. People care about it... more than they've cared for text-based content in a long while. And, with that there are no dollars flowing from it. The result of Medium's true success with content, is that they are now cutting one-third of their staff, shuttering two of their offices in New York and Washington and making proactive changes to their business model in an effort to figure out where the dollars may be outside of advertising. This is all happening as Medium does appear to have serious momentum. According to Ev's article about this situation, year-over-year, readers and published posts were up about 300%. Medium has raised over $130 million since it started. I'm hopeful that someone like Ev Williams can help us all figure out how to monetize content in a past-advertising model. 

Still, this is all very scary if you care about content, publishing, journalism, advertising and the future. 

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