Mitch Joel's Blog: Six Pixels of Separation, page 302

The New Digital Minimalism

How much of what are you putting online?

I was interested in a mobile app. I went to their website. There was not a lot of information. It featured two actions:

Download the app.

Watch a short video demo.

Nothing more. Nothing less.

There were no other tabs on the website. There were no testimonials, white papers, long-winded corporate drivel, jargon-filled product description and more. This brand was not treating their digital presence as a receptacle for all of their marketing collateral. They were laser focused on one, simple action: download the app. Why? Because we have come to this miraculous point in our business world where technology is removing the technology from technology (read that five times fast). The easier all of this stuff (from the hardware to the apps) is to use, the easier it will be to convince consumers to use them, share them and talk about them. The app is self-explanatory. Once you download it and open it up, all will be revealed.

Simple is as simple does.

It's somewhat counterintuitive to think like this, but as complex as marketing has become, it is the simplicity of the brand message and product that wins. The latest and greatest stuff doesn't do everything. In fact, it's the opposite. The latest and greatest stuff does one simple thing. And, it does it well. We are in the new era of digital minimalism. It is no longer a world where you need to have multiple pages for your website that push linking (internal and external) coupled with keyword stuffed text to game the search engines. The brands that are triumphant in the online world, are scaling back and making the experience as minimalistic as possible.

This will freak out the Chief Marketing Officer.

Marketers are going to have to adjust their attitudes and perceptions as to what marketing can be in this world of the new digital minimalism. Instead of stacking the homepage with the corporate stock price, news feed, product updates and more, the attitude needs to be adjusted. Consumers are moving through content at a voracious pace and yet we (the marketers) still pretend that everything we're publishing is some kind of destination in their consumer experience. It's to adapt to the new reality. This is less about short-attention spans and a consumer's ability to click away in a millisecond, and much more about creating a clear value chain that is steeped in minimalism.

One, simple thing.

If you can get a consumer hooked on one, simple thing, odds are that you can rinse and repeat this process. Many will (sadly) read that last line to mean that they can abuse the marketing flow. Those people will be direly wrong. Think minimalism. Think bare. Think simple. We often toss these words out into the marketing zeitgeist without really appreciating the amazing opportunity that we have - as a marketing industry - to truly add value to the consumer's life. No brand will ever be able to create the next Twitter without embracing the new digital minimalism.

Welcome to the new digital minimalism.

Tags:

brand message

chief marketing officer

cmo

consumer experience

digital marketing

digital minimalism

digital presence

marketing collateral

marketing industry

mobile app

search engine

technology

twitter

website

The Best Business Books Of 2012

Read a good business book this year? Looking for the perfect holiday gift?

I'm usually one to shy away from "best of" and list-like posts, but 'tis the season (as they say). Beyond that, it was a great year for reading and there are some marvelous gems that came out this year. So, whether you're looking for some end-of-the-year insights and motivation, or if you still haven't grabbed a gift for a loved one, here are some page-turners...

The Best Business Books of 2102.

Makers - The New Industrial Revolution by Chris Anderson. Whenever I get asked, "so what's next?" I now have something to point those people to. Reading this book reminds me of the feelings of excitement I used to get when reading newspaper and magazine articles about the Internet in the early nineties.

Quiet - The Power of Introverts in a World That Can't Stop Talking by Susan Cain. This one of those books that makes you stop, put it down and scream, "this is me! I'm more normal than I thought!" I wish I had this book in High School. I wish I would have had the emotional intelligence to truly understand it as well back then. It's a beautiful book about people who like to think, read and yes, be alone.

The Art of the Pitch - Persuasion and Presentation Skills that Win Business by Peter Coughter. There are so many illuminating moments and stories about how to win business in the agency game. I loved this book and re-read it multiple times. Coughter's writing style is pointed and very funny.

Damn Good Advice (For People with Talent!) - How To Unleash Your Creative Potential by America's Master Communicator by George Lois. Mad Men? That's tame compared to the life and times of George Lois. A true advertising renaissance man, this is a short book but filled with tons of great design that is diminished by the depth of content and life lessons. Thanks to George, I'm now unapologetic about wearing sneakers every day of my life. Thanks, George!

Daring Greatly - How the Courage to Be Vulnerable Transforms the Way We Live, Love, Parent, and Lead by Brene Brown. Courage, vulnerability, shame and more. Business is becoming personal and, thanks to beautiful minds like Brene Brown, it's not only acceptable, but smart to bring those emotions into leadership. This is one magical book.

Steal Like an Artist - 10 Things Nobody Told You About Being Creative by Austin Kleon. You could read this book in 30 minutes. Sadly, most people probably did. The only way you'll truly benefit from this book is to leave it within arm's reach at all time and reference it whenever you're feeling stuck, frustrated or uninspired. There is gold within these pages.

The Impact Equation - Are You Making Things Happen or Just Making Noise? by Chris Brogan and Julien Smith. With their follow-up to Trust Agents, my good friends, Chris Brogan and Julien Smith, are back. No, this isn't another social media book. It's a book about doing a lot more than tweeting and Facebooking... it's a book about creating impact. Here's the thing: it's not easy, it's hard work and most people will, sadly, read this, nod in agreement but not take action. Don't be one of those people.

11 Rules for Creating Value in the Social Era by Nilofer Merchant. I really thought I was done with books about social media and social business. It's not that I was down on them, but that I had read them all and felt like there was too much repetition. Then, I read Nilofer's book and realized that few have been able to synthesize this changing business environment in such a powerful way.

The (Honest) Truth about Dishonesty - How We Lie to Everyone-Especially Ourselves by Dan Ariely. Looking for a great book from one of the greatest thinkers out there? Grab this one. Dan Ariely is not only a world-famous Behavioral Economist, but an amazing storyteller.

Likeonomics - The Unexpected Truth Behind Earning Trust, Influencing Behavior, and Inspiring Action by Rohit Bhargava. What makes people like a brand (or an individual) and not another? Tough question, but this book breaks it down... and it's fascinating.

There are also a handful of books that I am thoroughly enjoying, but have not completely finished. These are worth checking out too:

Amazing Things Will Happen by C.C. Chapman. I only have a few chapters to go and I could not be prouder of my old friend, C.C. Chapman. This is not a business book. This is a book about life. He wrote it for his kids. The world needs more dads like C.C.

How Will You Measure Your Life? by Clayton M. Christensen. Another powerful book about life and how business can't be separated by it. So, make it count!

The Power of Habit - Why We Do What We Do in Life and Business by Charles Duhigg. Human beings don't like change. Change is hard. You've read a ton of books about how to be an agent of change, haven't you? Well, here's the truth: people love habit and changing those habits is hard work.

To Sell Is Human - The Surprising Truth About Moving Others - Daniel H. Pink. This one just arrived at my office. The official release date is December 31st. Still, After only a few chapters, I'm in love (like I am with every other piece of writing that Dan Pink creates). He also tackles a subject that is near and dear to my heart: selling with humanity.

Now, it's your turn: which business book in 2012 turned your head upside down?

Tags:

11 rules for creating value in the social era

amazing things will happen

austin kleon

best business books 2012

brene brown

business book

cc chapman

charles duhigg

chris anderson

chris brogan

clayton m christensen

damn good advice

dan ariely

dan pink

daniel h pink

daring greatly

george lois

how will you measure your life

julien smith

likeonomics

mad men

makers

nilofer merchant

peter coughter

quite

reading

rohit bhargava

social business

social media

social media book

steal like an artist

susan cain

the art of the pitch

the honest truth about dishonesty

the impact equation

the power of habit

to sell is human

trust agents

The Victim To Victor Mindset

Your actions. Your motivations.

A simple thing happened to me yesterday that made analyze how I make business decisions. I'm getting ahead of myself. Heading from Manhattan over to LaGuardia Airport in the early afternoon, something happened. I was booked on the 5:15 pm flight home, but there was a 3:30 pm flight that I was hoping to catch. As luck would have it, the 3:30 pm flight was cancelled, so I was stuck with a three hour gap of time at the airport. No biggie. It has happened before. Off to enjoy the quietness of the lounge. It turns out that their Internet connectivity was down. Normally, this isn't a big deal. I sat down, somewhat frustrated (because I had work to get done that required connectivity) and was beginning to think about the late night of work that I would have when I got home (and with that, I started feeling sorry for myself). Just then, I remembered seeing a sign for another airline lounge (but one that was still a part of the Star Alliance family). Without hesitation, I put my jacket back on, grabbed my luggage and headed over to this lounge. It was in another area of the terminal. I got to the lounge, checked in, grab some snacks, plugged in and managed to get everything done.

Victim or victor mindset?

The mass majority of people would have taken the words of the receptionist at the first lounge as gospel. There is nothing that can be done. Just go in, sit down and wait. There's no Internet. That's just the way it is. We are a victim of circumstance. The truth is that there may not be another way, but unless you try - by getting proactive and fast - you never know. Don't think for a second that I didn't ask the people at the gate if there was another flight to Montreal (there wasn't), or if I could fly home through a connection that would get me there in and around the same time as the earlier flight (there wasn't), or if they could transfer me to another airline with a flight that leaves sooner (there wasn't one). Instead of asking the person at the lounge if I can have access to the other lounge or if they had Internet connectivity over there, I just went for it. Better to be proactive and be wrong than to sit there as a victim of circumstance when I could have changed the circumstance.

"Practice doesn't make perfect. Perfect practice makes perfect."  

My close-quarter combatives coach (Tony Blauer) used to say that all of the time. You have to be prepared by knowing what to prepare for. Tony is also the person who first introduced me to the "victim to victor mindset." In short, if you're being attacked and all you're doing is saying to yourself, "I can't believe this is happening to me, why is this happening and why isn't anyone helping me?" you are in a victim mindset (and potentially about to lose your life). If, on the other hand, while you are being attacked, you are kicking, punching, gouging, scratching and screaming while saying those same things in your mind, you have shifted from a victim to a victor mindset because you are proactively doing something to negate the physical attack. No, you can't compare a lack of Internet access in a business class lounge to getting mugged on the street, but you can bring that same mindset into everything that you do. That lack of connectivity that propelled me to just move on, without asking or accepting my current lot in life, made me realize that most people don't even know they're making poor business decisions because they're simply living with a victim's mindset. You would be amazed at how often we don't see other opportunities in life because we fall prey to being the victim.

It's the little things.

It doesn't make me tough (I'm not). It doesn't make me more important (I'm not). It doesn't make me smart (I didn't do that good in school). It just means that with every negative bit of news that comes, my mindset is always one of being proactive instead of reactive. It's not always perfect. I don't always get it right. But, when it does turn out that my proactive actions did change the circumstance, I can't help but wonder how many people (and this, sometimes, includes myself when I forget about it) are the victim... and they don't even know it. Something tells me that we would not have the amazing entrepreneurs and innovations that we have in our lives if certain people didn't embrace the victim to victor mindset. That stupid lack of Internet access in the airport lounge gave me pause to think about my life and the choices I make... and - most importantly - how these choices are sometimes forced on me (and not a true reality). The more I think about the victim mindset against the victim to victor mindset, the more I see business and marketing applications that are profound.

Well, which one are you?

Tags:

airline lounge

business decision

close quarters combatives

entrepreneur

innovation

internet connectivity

marketing

star alliance

tony blauer

victim mindset

victim to victor mindset

The End Of The Smartphone

What will be the timeframe for smartphone and tablet devices to decimate desktop and laptop computers?

By all accounts, it is already happening. When Tim Cook (CEO at Apple) took the stage in the company's first post-Steve Jobs product launch to announce the iPad 2 in 2011, Cook's staggering statistic was that the iPad had already outsold all of the desktop and laptops sold by their competitors in the previous quarter. That piece of data still hold true as Apple currently has the fourth generation iPad in-market. Beyond the tablet, smartphones have also been steadily outselling desktop and laptop computers as well. While no media pundit is quite sure when (or if) the "year of mobile" happened, we are in the era of the smartphone. Beyond patent debates and legacy OEM manufacturers struggling to keep up, Apple and Android have set a furious pace as brands like Amazon, RIM, Microsoft and others continue to evolve from a personal computer business into a smartphone/tablet offering. It seems like we're moments away from the computer becoming an appliance as the smartphones and tablets become the remote controls for our lives.

The question is this: how long will this last?

Google co-founder, Sergey Brin, can often be found about town wearing his Google Glasses (aka Project Glass). While still in the prototype phase, the promise of Project Glass is a wearable (and highly portable) pair of glasses that gives the user a heads-up display to help connect them to their digital content while blending the information that they're seeing live and in-the-moment with Internet knowledge. Imagine things like taking pictures or seeing directions not by looking at a screen, but by simply seeing it in front of your face without distraction. Imagine being at a holiday party and being able to connect the face of someone whose name you should know to not only their contact information, but their entire social feed.

Sounds creepy? Most new technology does.

What will Apple do next? What is the technology that will disrupt the iPhone and iPad business? If you have read Walter Isaacson's Steve Jobs biography (and I strongly recommend that you do), there was a very telling (and compelling) line from Jobs: "If you don't cannibalize yourself, someone else will." Do you believe that Apple will now let Google take the lead in the future of connectivity? Do you think they're going to let Samsung, Nokia or even Microsoft leap ahead? You can be certain that deep within the industrial design studios of Jonathan Ive on Apple's corporate campus lies advanced prototypes of technology that either resembles or trumps Project Glass.

Things are about to get weirder as science fiction becomes reality.

You may be moaning that you would never wear a stupid looking pair of glasses that has you blinking, twitching and speaking to activate commands and information. Odds are that you never thought you would need email on the go, a fax machine or any other form of technology until everybody else started using it. Can we clearly point to something like Google's Project Glass and proclaim the end of the smartphone? Not yet, but it may not be as long off into the future as you suspect. On December 3rd, 2012 Business Insider ran a blog post titled, Apple Is Quietly Working To Destroy The iPhone, that points to Apple's penchant for wearable technology mixed with some patent fillings from the summer that Apple calls a, "head-mounted display" or "HMD." From the article: "...computers have been getting smaller and closer to our faces since their very beginning. First they were in big rooms, then they sat on desktops, then they sat on our laps, and now they're in our palms. Next they'll be on our faces."

The end of touch?

We went from controlling technology with keyboards, a mouse and buttons to touch in a flash of the eye. As touch continues to be the focus of smartphones and tablets, perhaps the introductions of technologies like Siri and Xbox's Kinect are really where we should spending more of our attention. The problem, of course, is that should wearable technology that is enabled and enhanced by Siri and Kinect-like technologies become the norm, marketers are (pardon the expression) screwed. As smartphones and tablets take hold with more of the population, marketing professionals are struggling to figure out how to transpose advertising and marketing messages in a succinct and successful way. To date, there are no clear winners in the realm of mobile marketing. Everything is still up for grabs. Just imagine what that could look like once wearable technology over-takes the smartphone and tablet. Many won't even begin to think about this because they believe the event horizon is too far off in the distance. If history (and technology) has taught us anything, it could happen tomorrow. Welcome to the era of exponential growth in business, technology and marketing.

Could the end of the smartphone also spell the end for digital advertising?

The above posting is my twice-monthly column for The Huffington Post called, Media Hacker . I cross-post it here with all the links and tags for your reading pleasure, but you can check out the original version online here:

The Huffington Post - What Comes After Smartphones?

Tags:

advertising

amazon

android

apple

blackberry

business column

business insider

desktop computer

digital advertising

digital content

email fax machine

google

google glasses

head mounted display

heads up display

hmd

industrial design

ipad

iphone

jonathan ive

kinect

laptop computer

marketing

marketing professionals

media hacker

media pundit

microsoft

mobile device

mobile marketing

nokia

online social network

personal computer

project glass

rim

science fiction

sergey brin

siri

smartphone

smartphone era

smasung

steve jobs

steve jobs biography

tablet

teachnology patent

technology

the huffington post

tim cook

walter isaacson

wearable technology

xbox

year of mobile

The Future Is The Connected Company

Episode #335 of Six Pixels of Separation - The Twist Image Podcast is now live and ready for you to listen to.

Innovation is something desperately and constantly needed in marketing. Thankfully, there are innovative thinkers like Dave Gray around to help us out. He is the author of two excellent books (Gamestorming and The Connected Company), and is currently the SVP of Strategy at the Dachis Group. In full disclosure, I was most interested in speaking with Gray after reading The Connected Company and did not even realize that he was also the author of Gamestorming. The truth is that social media has changed more than the marketing part of business (hence, the burgeoning term, "social business"). It's going to take discussions - like the one you are about to hear - and lot more c-suite actions for all of us to better understand how this all comes together. 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 Twist Image Podcast #335.

Tags:

advertising podcast

blog

blogging

brand

business book

dachis group

dave gray

david usher

digital marketing

facebook

gamestorming

itunes

marketing

marketing blogger

marketing podcast

online social network

podcast

podcasting

social media

the connected company

Six Links Worthy Of Your Attention #129

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, the author of Complete Web Monitoring and Managing Bandwidth: Deploying QOS in Enterprise Networks), Hugh McGuire (The Book Oven, LibriVox, iambik, PressBooks, Media Hacks) and I decided that every week or so 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:

Nigellissima by Nigella Lawson - The Guardian . "'Nigella Lawson is hot. So hot. She might just have to take off her shirt. And lick this whipped cream to quench her thirst. Ooo, naughty.' In the UK, it's a running joke that celebrity chef Nigella Lawson sells crumpet along with, well, her crumpet. So this review of her latest cookbook is spot on." (Alistair for Hugh).

The Wheel of Karma, Microsoft Division - The Atlantic . "Steve Sinofsky's widely publicized departure from Apple in the wake of the Maps debacle has been discussed plenty. But there's nothing as poignant--or schadenfraude-filled--as James Fallows' cleverly-worded, lawyer-dodging comeuppance. Karma's a bitch." (Alistair for Mitch).

Summer Reading... and Programming - Robin Sloan . "This is kind of cool. A book review of Close To The Machine by Ellen Ullman , but one that gets the reader of the review do some light javascript programming." (Hugh for Alistair).

information in Bb - YouTube . "Looking over the catalog of links I've sent to Mitch and Alistair over the past year, I am struck by their lack of staying power: interesting in the moment, but not ultimately all that meaningful. I'm going to make a small effort to find and pass along things that I expect to have some more universal/lasting resonance (for me at least). We'll see how that goes. Here is a spoken word/poem called 'Information.'" (Hugh for Mitch).

4D transistor: The future of computers? - Futurity . "Technology is awesome. It's not just the software and the cloud, but the hardware as well. Whenever I pick up my iPhone , I can't help but think to myself that everything I saw on Star Trek and Star Wars growing up is becoming a reality. Who would have thunk it? While everyone else is thinking about apps and the next Facebook , it is stuff like this that truly gets me excited about technology. Smart people engineering the next breed of hardware. Thin and light beyond words means that technology is quickly becoming invisible. This is about a few short steps more in that direction." (Mitch for Alistair).

This Vintage-Looking Vending Machine Dispenses Rare Books For Just $2 - Fast Company . "Creativity meets retail meets books. I'd love to see this idea evolve beyond niche, independent booksellers and be placed in more public spaces. Helping people discover magical worlds of words for a couple of bucks. What does this mean for the future of selling books? Nothing much. But, it is an attention grabber, something that made me smile and it gave me a sense that there are people out there (better than I) who are protecting and preserving the value of great literature in a world of tweets and Facebook timelines." (Mitch for Hugh).

Now it's your turn: in the comment section below pick one thing that you saw this week that inspired you and share it.

Tags:

alistair croll

apple

bitcurrent

close to the machine

complete web monitoring

ellen ullman

fast company

futurity

gigaom

hugh mcguire

human 20

iambik

iphone

james fallows

librivox

link bait

link exchange

link sharing

managing bandwidth

media hacks

nigella lawson

pressbooks

robin sloan

star trek

star wars

steve sinofsky

the atlantic

the book over

the guardian

year one labs

youtube

Great Marketing Is Utilitarian

The pleasures of shopping for food.

In any supermarket chain, some things are easy to find. Apples. Milk. Bread. But if you're looking for flaxseeds? Coconut milk? Prunes? Who among us has not felt the stirrings of super-market rage as we crisscross the fluorescent-lit maze of shelves, our shopping carts banging together as we search for a single palatable salami?

This is a problem good marketing can solve.

Meijer, a regional market and grocery chain, has close to two hundred stores in Michigan, Ohio, Indiana, Illinois and Kentucky. Through their seventy-five years, the family-owned business has seen dramatic changes in their retail experience. Their philosophy of "...take care of your customers, team members, and community... and all of those will take care of you, just like a family," sounds earnest enough, but in a world where supercenters and mass retailers are becoming grocers, and local farmer's markets are seeing a resurgence, the pressure to stay competitive and relevant at the local level is intense. While it may not be a silver bullet, the is much more than a store map and couponing engine. Once you have put in your shopping list and chosen your store, the app will order your list to create the most efficient route through the store. If you go off course, the app will self-adjust as you go along.

So why don't more brands do this -- solve the most frustrating problems we experience when we use their product or service?

If you look at the typical diatribe about "marketing being dead" or "advertising being dead," you quickly realize that all solutions talk about the imperative to forge a deeper, more powerful connection with the consumer. In short, brands can create loyalty by being more personable, helpful and likable.

But that's not enough.

Brands may be saying that they want engagement and conversations with consumers, but that's not what consumers want. (Do you really want to "engage" with your grocery store? No. You want to get your food and go home.) Thanks to the Web, any brand can have an idea and publish it to the Web in text, images, audio and/or video. This can be done instantly, free, and immediately. It's pretty amazing. And yet, with this tremendous access and disintermediated channel, what have we gotten? For the most part, a lot of very traditional advertising messages. They may be glitzed up to look like something more than a moment of distraction to sell a consumer on a new product or benefit, but the truth is that the vast majority of brands are still chasing the same advertising model, just in different types of media.

There is another way.

Brands can create a utility. Something that people don't just want, but need. Something that would earn this brand the covered spot on the homescreen of their consumer's smartphones and tablets. Marketing is no longer just about messaging and brand loyalty. Now, brands can provide a high level of utility with real tools that consumers need to enhance their daily lives. Think it's not possible? It is.

Enter: Utilitarian marketing.

What the Internet, mobile technology, and social networking tools have provided companies is the power to provide a level of utility to their consumers that they could never provide before. So why aren't more brands doing this? Because it's hard. Take branded apps, like Meijer's. On any given Sunday, you can drum up all kinds of depressing data about how many people download branded apps and use them only once (or, more depressingly, downloaded them and never used them). These are the exact data points that the devil's advocates in the room like to mention when they try to argue that mobile isn't important. Well, whatever data you have on branded apps and their usage has lied to you. Branded app usage doesn't suck... the majority of branded apps suck, so people don't bother to use them more than once. A brand's success is driven by their location. From the physical store that has a lot of foot traffic to a corporate office that will attract the right client. The new real estate in winning the hearts and minds of the consumer is that elusive homescreen.

The winning brands will do this by doing one thing phenomenally well: provide true utility.

Meijer is not alone in providing a truly useful mobile marketing app, but marketing with a utility-first mindset is still in a nascent stage. Brands like Uniqlo, LEGO, Procter & Gamble, Skullcandy and more have begun to claim land in this powerful territory as well. The trick is in not making these initiatives a parlor trick, but part of a well-thought out and strategic campaign. Now, take a step back and ask yourself this:  How much of my marketing is a true utility for my consumer?

Now, what are you going to do about it?

The above posting is my twice-monthly column for the Harvard Business Review . I cross-post it here with all the links and tags for your reading pleasure, but you can check out the original version online here:

Harvard Business Review - Great Marketing Is Utilitarian .

Tags:

advertising

advertising is dead

brand engagement

brand loyalty

brand messaging

branded app

business column

great marketing

grocer

harvard business review

internet

lego

local farmers market

marketing

marketing is dead

mass retailer

media

meijer

meijer find-it app

mobile app

mobile marketing

mobile technology

procetr and gamble

publishing

retail

retail experience

skullcandy

smartphone

supercenter

tablet

traditional advertising

uniqlo

utilitarian marketing

utilitarianism marketing

Do You Need A Degree In Digital Marketing And Social Media?

How important is a formal education for a career in marketing?

I get asked this question a lot. Most people want to know where I studied all of this stuff and what type of certification I have. I am certifiable. I am not certified. I dropped out of university because I was (at the time) already publishing magazines. My general train of thought was that it would be easier to go back to school should my career in media not work out than to stay in school and try to manage the workload of running my own publishing company while attempting to secure a degree. Regrets? I have a few. It would be great to have a MBA or degree (of some kind) in business. I think I missed out on the social dynamics of being in university, but I never let my lack of formal schooling get in the way of my education.

What about digital marketing and social media?

Universities and colleges now offer courses in the area of digital media, online strategy, social media, web analytics, search engine marketing and more. Some universities even have diploma degrees. Are they any good? Are they worth it? It depends on what you're trying to accomplish in your career. From a professional perspective, these courses and degrees are not compulsory to have in order to be successful in digital marketing. On top of that, these courses and degrees have not become commonplace enough (or even prestigious) to have the same cache as a formal MBA or degree in project management. In short, while a degree or course completion may impress a HR recruiter for a digital marketing shop, it is not essential to getting the gig.

That doesn't mean that they're bad.

Figuring out if a course is the right fit for your career is not easy, but doing some homework around the university, the instructor and the course outline is mandatory. If you can't find out information in a general search (on Google, Bing, Yahoo or whatever), leverage your online social networks (Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn, tumblr, etc...) to ask those you are connected to. It's also important to see how active the university or the instructors are on the digital platforms. So, if you're asking a question about these courses and they're not even listening/responding, that could qualify as an indicator as to how well-versed they are in the digital realm (or how active they are).

Where does this leave you?

Whether it's an unaccredited course or a formal university degree, I still believe that the best instructor you can have is yourself. If you are truly interested in being successful in social media and digital marketing, there is a simple two-step process that you can take... and you can start today.

Learning. You don't (just) need a course to learn. Between books and blogs and articles and iTunes U and more, the ability for anybody to learn the basics and have a solid foundation as to how these marketing engines work and perform is unlimited. My good friend, Avinash Kaushik (Digital Marketing Evangelist at Google) has a great startup called, Market Motive that offers self-paced and coached online courses that are well-worth the money as well. For a few hundred dollars over at Amazon to going through the blogroll at the left of this blog post (for free!), you will have years and years of content to help you learn.

Doing. If we have learned anything in the past decade-plus about social media, it is that there is no harm in actually trying things. Start tinkering. Join the online social networks and follow people who interest you. Start using Google Reader as a destination to curate and engage with a handful of blogs that specialize in the area that interests you most (and get active in the comments). Why not start a blog, so that you can ask (and answer) the burning questions that you need answers to. Your perspective many not be fully crystallized, but by the sheer act of creating content, you will better understand how to use and leverage these publishing platforms to get an idea to spread.

It starts with you.

Do not wait for a course to give you the answers. The answers are everywhere. Dive in. Be curious. Show up. Be serious. Be passionate. Be open. You will be amazed by the amount of content at your disposal (some good, some bad) and you will also be amazed by how many likeminded people you will discover on this journey, who can help and mentor you on to the next level in your education. Don't get me wrong, a formal education has its merits and there is value in certification. That being said, this is still a brave new world, and it is both ever-changing and constantly evolving. The best education (for my dollar) has been in following the people who are smarter than me (again, check out the blogroll to the left) and then doing some of the critical thinking heavy work right here on this blog.

Remember: education is not just about taking a course or getting a degree. Education is about your desire to learn and grow. There has never been a better time (or place) to do that than right here... right now.

(special thanks to Alyssa for the email question about courses and certification for the inspiration).

Tags:

amazon

avinash kaushik

bing

blog

blogroll

career in marketing

digital marketing

digital marketing degree

digital media

digital platform

digital realm

education

facebook

google

google reader

itunes u

linkedin

market motive

marketing

mba

media

online social network

online strategy

project management

publishing

search engine marketing

social media

social media degree

tumblr

twitter

university degree

web analytic

yahoo

Business Should Motivate You

I was thinking about this (a lot) the other day...

I had to review some edits for my new book, CTRL ALT DEL (out in May 2013), and I realized that I had written about a similar thought as I had in my first book, Six Pixels of Separation (2009). The crux of the thinking goes like this: you will hear a vast majority of professionals say something akin to: "it's nothing personal, it's just business." To be blunt, that's B.S. I don't know about you, but I spend the vast majority of my waking hours thinking about not only the business of Twist Image, but what I can do to achieve more. If I don't take business personally, what is the point? I can't even think of something that I should take more personally. Can you?

A deeper reflection.

I had the pleasure of being in Charlotte, North Carolina on Tuesday to record an upcoming webinar with Jeffrey Gitomer (best-selling business book author of The Sales Bible, The Little Red Book of Selling, Social BOOM! and countless other tomes that are quick-witted and provide striking insights into how to be better at work). The webinar is called, Jeffrey Gitomer's Webinar Boot Camp 2012 {Re•define} Yourself (it's not free, so click on the link if you would like more details). As I sat in his studio, sitting side-by-side with Gitomer, I had this strange feeling come over me. When I first got interested in business books, I fell madly and deeply in love with three authors: Jeffrey Gitomer, Seth Godin and Tom Peters. Once blogging and online content became pervasive, I could hardly believe how much free insights and goodness these people were sharing (and, to this day, I can't wait to see what they come up with - each and every day - in places like Facebook, Twitter, YouTube and beyond). I guess it just felt strange to be a part of his content rather than a customer of it (which I am). On the flight home, I asked myself: "what did you learn today?" 

Nothing. Everything.

There wasn't one thing. There were many things. It wasn't obvious. I feel like I am better. We often push personal development to the side. I realized, on the two-hour flight home, that I had an amazing day of personal business development. A lot of it probably won't sink in for months. A lot of it will probably only surface in a way that may not even seem obvious to me. With that, I also realized that seeking motivation in personal development is not the same as seeking business motivation to do and achieve more. Seth Godin recently did a 37 minute video interview with the Good Life Project. This isn't the typical Seth Godin fare that will fill your brain with ideas about what you should be doing in business. In this video, Seth talks a lot about his personal journey and desire to do more interesting things, projects and stuff. Yes, Godin is always motivational, but there's something about this video that is profound in terms of business motivation.

I don't know about you...

I ate my lunch at my office desk yesterday (which I rarely do) and I decided to let this video interview run while chomping on some salad. It stopped me dead in my tracks. It was true business motivation. It moved me to do a lot more work than I had intended to. It also created a mental model for me to focus on when the desire to click over to the Facebook or Twitter tab on my Web browser seems more desirable than the work that needs to get done.  

I don't know about you, but I need more business motivation in my life. So, please watch this and tell me if you can just sit idly by...

Tags:

business

business book

business motivation

content

ctrl alt del

facebook

good life project

jeffrey gitomer

personal business development

personal development

publishing

redefine yourself webinar

seth godin

social boom

the little red book of selling

the sales bible

tom peters

twitter

youtube

The Future Of Digital

We live an era of exponential business and marketing growth.

That's right, we no longer see business moving in a linear fashion. The growth has become exponential (magnificent rises and terrible burn-outs). While many pundits will argue that not much has changed in the world of business, I'm bullish on digital and the disruption it has caused - and will continue to cause in the coming years. My next book, CTRL ALT DEL (out in May 2013) will look at five movements that have fundamentally changed business forever, but that businesses are still not paying any attention to. It will also tackle what you (and I) will need to bring to the proverbial table to be employable within this time of purgatory (as I will define it in the business book). Having a view of the horizon is critical to our success, future and making our way out of purgatory to The Promised Land. In the past short while, Henry Blodget (CEO and EIC at Business Insider) and Mary Meeker (general partner at Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers) has both released their respective data and insights on digital. These two trend decks are (and continue to be) the most informative pieces of content to better understand how connected consumers are in our digital society.

Stop everything and spend so time looking at this... 

2012 KPCB Internet Trends Year-End Update from Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers

Tags:

business

business book

business growth

business insider

ctrl alt del

digital disruption

henry blodget

internet trends

kleiner perkins caufield and byers

marketing growth

mary meeker

the future of digital