Archive for the ‘Blogroll’ Category

Real social impact from social networks

Sunday, June 21st, 2009

If you doubt the potential of Twitter, Facebook and other social media, read this recent column by Nicholas Kristoff in the New York Times. The depth of meaning here is amazing. Twitter is an outlet for the voices of freedom in Iran; the ongoing human rights situation in China creates the impetus for incredible cyber innovation; and the United States could help, but doesn’t necessarily have to do anything except watch quietly.

Social media is not just the latest iteration of the Web; it’s already embedded in world-changing events.

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Posted in Blogroll, Business, Citizen Journalism, Future of media, politics

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Selling what your customers want v. what they need

Friday, June 19th, 2009

Content marketing guy Newt Barrett turns around conventional wisdom, suggesting that instead of working to develop a unique selling proposition, you develop a Unique Buying Proposition. This is more than a semantic turn. The UBP forces you to think like your customers. It changes the question from “Why should they buy from me?” to “Why do they WANT to buy from me?”

You can read Newt’s complete case here.

Be honest: Would you spend more time buying this...

Would you do a better job buying this...

In the meantime, I’ll add this thought on selling: People will spend more to buy something they want than something they need. The corollary is that they’ll do whatever they can to avoid buying what they need, whereas they enjoy buying things they want.

So even if you’re offering business-to-business products or services, there is a benefit to communicating in a way that helps people WANT to buy what you’re selling.

... or this?

... or this?

If they feel the product has value-added benefits, some kind of cache, or is exciting and transformative, they’ll buy more readily (and tend to be more pleased) than if they buy something because it has the lowest price or simply fills an urgent need.

That’s the beauty of Newt’s concept of the UBP: It helps your prospects to see your product as something they WANT to buy.

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Posted in Blogroll, Business, Starting a business

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A must-read for all you content types (that’s ‘editorial’) in the old paradigm

Wednesday, June 10th, 2009

recessionwire-logo1Here are 7 non-nonsense rules for any editorial types who plan to survive the 2009 Media Meltdown and transform themselves into the content creators of the future. For the detail, read the original blog on Recessionwire, written by Laura Rich, a journalist and regular contributor there.

  1. Readers are your competitors — and your friends.
  2. Identify your expertise.
  3. Build your brand.
  4. Be transparent.
  5. Crowdsource (actively seek participation in the development of your story).
  6. Use self service tools.
  7. Interact with your readers.

You’ll find the full explanation behind each at the original blog.

Go forth, do good and do well.

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Posted in Blogroll, Future of media

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On the art of ‘followership’

Wednesday, June 10th, 2009


In his dependably brief and insightful blog, marketing guru Seth Godin writes about this video of a spontaneously developing community  at a dance festival: “My favorite part happens just before the first minute mark. That’s when guy #3 joins the group. Before him, it was just a crazy dancing guy and then maybe one other crazy guy. But it’s guy #3 who made it a movement.  Initiators are rare indeed, but it’s scary to be the leader. Guy #3 is rare too, but it’s a lot less scary and just as important. Guy #49 is irrelevant. No bravery points for being part of the mob.
“We need more guy #3s.”

There are lots of lessons you can take away from this. The one it most illustrates for me has to do with starting a business or launching a new product. More than once I’ve found myself dealing with a leading-edge product that I thought was brilliant. Too often, the response from the target market was, “Interesting. We’ll wait and see.”

The first copycat to come out with a similar product validates it, and makes it easier to sell. The next competitor helps flip the switch among customers from “wait and see” to “hurry up and buy.”

One’s an innovator; two’s competition; three’s a movement.

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Posted in Blogroll, Business, Social Media Marketing, Starting a business, humor

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American Pie send-up on media

Friday, June 5th, 2009

apie2Anyone living through the media meltdown will enjoy this clever 9-minute rewrite of the old Don McLean anthem.

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Posted in Blogroll, Future of media, humor

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Dinosaurs alive and well in era of Web 3.0

Tuesday, June 2nd, 2009

In his blog on PBS.org, Mark Glaser writes about the recent Wall Street Journal D All Things Digital conference — a premium-priced conference for high flyers on, well, all things digital. Glaser’s blog post is an easy, breezy read with some ironic takeaways:

1. Live blogging was prohibited, he writes, because organizers feared it would create reason for more people to choose not to attend.

2. Video-taping was prohibited, which is a pretty standard rule at such events, even though the gifts given to paid attendees included a Flip HD video camera — which is so small and easy to use it practically begs you to take videos wherever you’re not allowed.

3. The founders of Twitter spoke but, according to Glaser, didn’t have anything to say. Is anyone surprised by that? I’m sure if they’d had a window of 12 seconds (the visual equivalent of 140 characters) they would have seemed pithy and brilliant.

Not ironic, but certainly important, is the recognition that the progress of the WWW has moved from its first generation of on-demand information, through its second iteration of social and participatory applications, into the third generation of data clouds and on-demand applications

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Posted in Blogroll, Business, Future of media, Social Media Marketing

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10 YOUNG entrepreneurs to watch

Tuesday, June 2nd, 2009

From ContentNext, with link to same

Warning: If you have more than 20 years already invested in your career, this is going to make you very tired and at least a little bit scared. Here, from ContentNext.com are 10 young entrepreneurs to watch. By young, they mean really young — no older than their 20s.

What’s most instructive and startling is the transformational nature of what these kid are doing. Their businesses are, largely, based on ideas that couldn’t even have existed 5 or 10 years ago.

If you have any questions about the power of the Internet to foster change; or if you have any doubt that the next generation does things very differently than you’re used to, then you ought to spend 10 minutes scanning this article. Then resist the temptation to take a nap.

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Posted in Blogroll, Business, Social Media Marketing, Starting a business

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Can Obama be good for business?

Thursday, May 28th, 2009

Conventional wisdom among many of the people I know — regardless of how they feel about  President Obama’s social agenda — is that his economic agenda is pretty tough on business.

As reported by Stacy Blackman at bnet.com, Dr. Robert Frank at Cornell University’s Johnson School of Management and a New York Times columnist, feels othewise. I’m especially intrigued by his view on universal health care.

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Posted in Blogroll, Business, politics

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