Audi RS "Moments of Truth" is a series of highly stylized, dynamic short-form documentaries that capture a moment in time -- visual, visceral proof of the im...
Marty Note I thought of my friend John van den Brink (@DotComSocial) when I happened upon this amazing Audi ad. John understands racing. I understand great advertising and this is a great example of how to start fast and go faster. You can't watch this ad and not have your heart pounding.
Some things stand out as laudable including:
* Pacing is amazing.
* Jump cuts are smooth and yet frantic.
* European drivers talking = brilliant as feels more authentic.
Apparently, the Quora user who asked this question was looking for a Web service where he could hire a personnal Web assistant - a human being, he wouldn't trus an algorithm - to be that person.
"So why don't you try to be that person?" started my answer.
"Nobody knows your interests better than you do and no one can make a judgement on what is relevant to them better.
Lack of time, right?"
Rest is on Quora but the short story is that I felt the new topic-centric model of social media, combined with Curation (like we have on Scoop.it), is precisely serving that goal: highly personalized information, curated by informed, expert and relevant human beings on a given topic.
Marty Note I agree with one of Scoop.it's founders. Guilluame defines the essence of the curation revolution - a person empowered with the right tools is a superhero. The advantages to doing your own curation include:
* Curation changes YOU and then IT.
* Curation is an artistic expression of who YOU are.
* Curation is love and journey those things that make us alive and human.
* Can't delegate thinking (lol).
I remember purchasing a computer with my own money in 1984. My management thought I was "playing", but they kept a watchful eye on me. As long as my "playing" didn't interfere with my ability to sell M&M's and I was using my own money I could play.
Their attitude was computers were for assistants and not brilliant managers like them. Wonder where they are today? The revolution came to town and their response was to delegate it out. I've surfed this magical digital revolution wave my entire career and it just keeps getting bigger. About as much fun as one can have surfing :). Who would ever delegate surfing?
Love the analogy with personal computers and assistant, Marty: great one! I've actually never been good at having a PA myself (for the short time I had one in my pre-startup life...).
Invest in smarter and smarter tools: let the human brain take care of the rest :-)
Agree G
It is impossible to anticipate all the strange connections the right set of human brains will create, strange, wonderful and always where the money is :). Impossible to delegate that out to even the smartest tool or an army of assistants.
I did have an amazing "assistant" when I worked at NutraSweet. Michele knew how to clear away the BS so I could THINK - much needed in a Fortune 1,000 where there is BS to be cleared. Now, like you, I use tools to get close to what Michele did so magically back in the day.
One of my favorite Michele stories is I couldn't get a meeting with the President of H. J. Heinz to save my life. The "Top To Top" meeting was in my goals and so getting the meeting meant a bonus, something I didn't care about, and solving a perplexing puzzle, something I did care about.
Michele gets on the phone with her counterpart in David Scully's office (brother of John Scully of Apple fame) and I have the impossible to get meeting inside of 15 minutes. I doubt the "assistant" network that was so well intact then is as easy to tap into now, but it was amazing to see how easy something could be when the right person was on it (lol).
Marty
These are just a few of the ways you can tap into the unprecedented power of today's customer and help them become your strongest supporters without spending an extra dime on traditional marketing.
Marty Note Great article if a tad oversold. The title was, "No Marketing Budget, No Problem". Yeah I've been Internet marketing a long time and there is no free lunch here anymore. Can you use the tactics outlined here to help you REDUCE your marketing spend and increase your team's effectiveness and make more money? Yes, is it free? Not even a little bit (lol).
Here is the problem this Huffington Post article doesn't broach. Who is going to watch, interpret and tweak all of these new free tactics. Who is going to understand what they really mean and if that meaning is good or bad.
I've been an Internet marketer for 12 years. I have Gladwell's 10,000 hours in and every one of those hours taught me something I use daily. The idea great Internet marketing is only a matter of reading a post and away you go is absurd.
Yes you might read this excellent article and hit a home run. Someone is going to win the lottery this week too, but Internet marketing isn't about one at bat. Internet marketing is about hitting consistently better than .300 and learning to do so takes TIME and MONEY.
Here is the hidden fallacy of this article. Even if you learn to carry all the water that needs carrying up the mountain the sweat equity you put in costs "money" in the form of TIME and opportunity costs (while you are learning Internet marketing you aren't doing something else).
As we all already know, there is no free lunch. I like the tactics here and would advise any client to use them. I've used some of them, we had a great "Buzz Team" of customers we gave special jobs to when I was an Ecommerce Director, so the small cost of reading this article should bear positive ROI fruit.
Fritjof Capra, in his book ‘The Hidden Connections’ applies aspects of complexity theory, particularly the analysis of networks, to global capitalism and the state of the world; and eloquently argues the case that social systems such as organisations and networks are not just like living systems – they are living systems. The concept and theory of living systems (technically known as autopoiesis) was introduced in 1972 by Chilean biologists Humberto Maturana and Francisco Varela.
This is a complete version of a ‘long-blog’ written by Al Kennedy on behalf of ‘The Nature of Business’ blog and BCI: Biomimicry for Creative Innovation www.businessinspired...
Marty Note I've been fascinated with emergence in biology for years reading E. O. Wilson and others. This looks cool and along those lines. I'm somewhere between emergence, systems not requiring top down authority to build things like ants and bees, and weather-like models where we can forecast emergent "fronts" based on news, past behaviors, time of year and archived Internet behavioral data.
Every day I trawl the web for stories about Content. If they're any good, you'll find them here.
The rules are simple:
1. Original work only. No shameless plagiarising, no old ideas recycled, no keyword-rich SEO crud.
2. No sales pitches. Duh.
3. It's got to be good. I am looking for intelligence. There are maybe a dozen bona fide content thought leaders in the world. We need more.
>>>How To Find A Topic. Use the Filter tab above and enter a keyword.<<<
If you like a story, click the Share button. Rescoop it, tweet it, email your friends. Do something. The content strategy industry is in its infancy. Help it grow.
Did you know that there are a whopping 7.38 billion pages on the internet? This infographic by CopyPress explores the four content realms.
Marty Note Actually I did know that since I was doing research on the size of the web the other day. The point is NOISE is deafening now. We are all in the business of cutting through clutter. Video is my favorite way to do that right now because it is less DENSE with quality content.
The other reason I love video is the Visuals crushing the Textuals trend I've discussed on Scoop.it. Visual tools, visual information is a must in a, "Please pre-digest this for me as I am in a HURRY," contemporary society of more and more, faster and faster and better and better (another favorite theme LOL).
This infographic demonstrates the point. I write this same article it gets a quarter of the audience and 10% of the shares this graphic will get. We are heading toward some kind of a mashed up hybrid since video has it limitations too (easy to do BAD, takes a lot of production time and it will get as crowded as text eventually).
Online advertising industry breaks through $3b barrier with growth across all ...PRWire12th August 2012: Online advertising has sustained its strong growth and surpassed the $3b expenditure mark for the financial year ending 30th June 2012.
Marty Note The other side of this announce is the death of print and traditional advertising. Print and traditional can be used to amplify what is or could go viral with a little push, but building a market? Not so much.
Much has been made about the marketing opportunity that lies beneath social media. As business Facebook pages and Twitter accounts become virtually universal and consumers are able to connect with their trusted brands ...
Thanks for picking this up Don. Have a great weekend and saw maxOz thanked us both on Twitter (she rocks pretty good :). Appreciate all of your support and your take on things. Marty
Brian, you are Digital Leader of the Week on the Revolutions. That accolade and $4 bucks gets you coffee at Starbucks (loll), but you have my appreciation and gratitude and that is worth something :). Thanks for all your hard work, help and mentoring. Marty
Although brand adoption of Google+ is way behind other social networks, notably Facebook and Twitter, some businesses have jumped in and are making waves to stir up interest, engagement and interaction with their fans on Google+.
Appreciate Malek's thanks especially since this was his find and did really well on the revolutions. You rock Malek! Much appreciated and have a great weekend. Marty
We get sucked in by ads every day and most of the time it’s no big deal. We are consumers, and that will never change. We need to replace products that we have finished, and we are always on the lookout for products that will improve our lives.
Marty Note I like Jane's article as a summary of some of my favorite "tricks". I don't think of offers as "tricks" more as ideas or memes. If we can create a way to explained a complicated thing fast and it converts then "tricks" is my Internet marketing game (lol).
This article from June is an excellent summary of some of my favorite offers such as:
* Buy More, Save More
* Coupons * New and Improved
I was trained in marketing by the king of New and Improved (P&G) and, if anything, the pace of our consuming desire for New and Improved has dramatically increased with our emerging networked, mobile and social shopping world. We can curate, parse and find THE NEW faster than ever before putting pressure on marketing teams to keep up.
Marty Note Cool Cradle To Cradle Product Category Consortium I don't know why Cradle-To-Cradle hasn't gotten more traction. Cool branded way of saying the complex idea of sustainability. Cradle-To-Cradle is about changing the product development lifecycle to plan a products creation, use and movement back into the food chain in some meaningful way OTHER than rotting in a landfill.
The amazing concept, when I read the Cradle-To-Cradle book, is planning is a little bit more arduous but hardly prohibitive. A little extra pain upfront gets paid back 10x by the time the life cycle is complete. I liked the concept and it felt easy enough to shift our product development thinking. This consortium jumps down in the weeds FAST and so is really speaking mostly to the already committed.
Adding some, "Come Join Us," copy and testimonials would help me understand how to join. The site has that, "If you have to ask you can't join," feel to it. I dig that approach for exclusive clubs, but for anything that needs ME to promote YOU then break down the intimidation factor with some LIKE ME stuff and then give me a job. I'm going to put this site on my "watch list" to see if I can fit it into the "green" movement trend in some meaningful way.
Friday Note Working on my LinkedIn Profile (http://www.linkedin.com/in/martysmith1980vc) I noticed some more interesting data. My Scoop.it SEOmoz Page Authority is 64, Twitter is 66. This means Scoop.it's authoirty is almost equal in 1 year what it has taken me five to create with Twitter. That much difference speaks to superior code, approach and team.
Scoop.it Vs. Twitter Wow, I realized today that Scoop.it has helped build a community that is 30% as large as Twitter in 20% of the time and half the effort (granted that is a judgment call and not in the data :).
Twitter - 1,800 followers since 208 (5 years) Scoopit - 630 followers since 2011 (1 year)
35% of my total Twitter community built in 20% of the time.
Churn The Revolutions may have lost some people who subscribed on Scoop.it, but I haven't noticed. Twitter churns 5% of my @ScentTrail community a day. There are Twitter accounts set up to unfollow the minute you follow (had fun toggling an account set up this way the other day). Twitter's list churn is 100% greater than Scoop.it.
Spammers & Trolls Part of this big churn number is the people using Twitter for spam. Let's knock on wood together as we note how blissfully spam and troll (people who say mean things just to get a rise) free Scoop.it is.
Effort Level Twitter takes much more work EXCEPT when I use Scoop.it as the master manager. I manage 4 Twitter accounts and @Scenttrail (https://twitter.com/ScentTrail ) is the easiest because it is tied to my Scoop.it.
SEO Value Twitter had great SEO but their inability to be bought or play nice with Google has vastly reduced the power that was there in 2008. I haven't done the research to know how badly content supported by Twitter has fallen, but it FEELS like it has reduced its SEO power footprint since my Twitter feed pulled a PR5 within weeks of going up. Scoop.it, on the other hand has done great earning absolute #1 on "Curation Revolution" since I put it up.
I'm not saying drop Twitter. I am saying Scoop.it is producing more results for less effort and is earning its place right in the middle of all of my social marketing as I stated in a ScentTrail Marketing post a few days ago:
I agree Scoop.it is my Twitter content manager. Twitter does give me a large number of hits back to my Scooped content. Another plus is Scoop.it has helped to build my Twiiter followers. Scoop good content and guess what, people will follow. Good content curation takes time and planning.
Marty - Brian is right, as he usually is, I undercounted how valuable Twitter has been in building my Scoop.it community. Doubtful my community would have grown as fast without the help of the roughly 1,500 people I started tweeting my Scoops to.
I've noticed that I gain quality Twitter followers by using Scoop.it because the auto-tweet usually includes the Twitter handle of the source. My list gain is at least 10% from this kind of inclusion since people I follow and Rescoop see my follow and return the favor.
This conversation reminds me of another Scoop.it benefit - not limited to 140 characters (lol) :). M
New research has revealed that the proliferation of smartphones and growth of social media is driving change in customer loyalty.
Photocredit via serve4impact.com
Marty Note Yeah increase the points of interaction and customers will either become more or less loyal. There is also a sea change where Internet marketers are refocusing efforts on KEEPING the traffic and customers they've already won at least once since margin is much better with people who know you.
Play nice with Google !Find out what the G-Monster THINKS your Web Site is about: http://t.co/0oPCngyC...
Marty Note Some of the most simple things are the most helpful. Here is a quick video about how to use that website section in Google's keyword tool to find out what google thinks your or your competitors sites are all about.
"Content curation has become, arguably, one of the most popular activities on the social web. Whether you’re sharing your favorite web links, playlists, videos or collections of images, users and tools have conspired to create a human-driven source of collecting and categorizing that is making the web more relevant. How better to find new music than to visit the collection of a friend or “netizen” who has similar tastes?
We've talked to the experts about what they use for inspiration, collaboration, and getting down to the business of design in a social media world. Here are some of the suggestions they offered up.
Marty Note Love these 10 new tools (new to me anyway) especially Icon Finder and 960 Grid System. Very cool, time saving and helpful social and web design "ditch digging" apps.
Have you ever wondered which elements of your website make the biggest impression? The following infographic is based on a recent eye-tracking study conducted by the Missouri University of Science and Technology depicting:
Marty Note We know, if we didn't already suspect, from Gladwell's Blink we have seconds before entire worlds are built in our visitors' minds. This infographic about first impressions is fascinating and helpful.
Viewing these stats should rebound all the way to how you design a homepage. If you have seconds what can you convey? Less than you are trying to pitch by at least half (lol). Time to get out Occam's Razor and get a good close shave. Remember Google's clean, sparse lines and cut away things no one is gong to "see" anyway.
Marty Like easy to follow ideas that can be expressed visually. This infogrpahic says, "If your marketing isn't working go one circle in." Easy and a process I've never thought of that could work.
Have you ever written a killer blog post or article only to Google the topic later and realize it's nowhere to be found in your search results? You're not alone.
Creating compelling content is only half the battle to the top, literally!
Content strategies are always growing and changing so understanding how search engines and social sites treat your content is key to being found.
This Infographic will help you understand some of the dynamics around search, content optimization, social and content marketing strategies. Included:
Trends in search and social media The factors for successful content creation and promotion A better understanding of what the content marketing mix should contain The relationship between search intent and conversion
Download Report - The Impact Of Real Time Content Optimization - http://bit.ly/QNT3jR
Thanks for great suggestion Susan. Very helpful as I am slammed at work preparing for a weekend long "retreat". You know the kind where your retreat your weekend away (lol). So your suggestions are helping me keep Scoop.it alive. Thanks. Marty
Women are changing the face of tech -- here are 41 names to know.
... Marty Cool article and all new to me. Was feeling a dearth of women entrepreneurs here in the Triangle, but I may be looking in the wrong places. Most of the startup events I attend are much more than 60% men. This article makes me think I am just looking in the wrong places. Amazing women entrepreneurs here.
Learn the five critical elements of content marketing for B2B and B2C businesses.
Marty Forbes is a trusted source and a content marketing leader. This article is a great example. Short and sweet they jump right in. Of these five my fav is "share worthiness" or, as Seth Godin says, PURPLE things, outstandingly great things are the only things we should create now.
Here is the rub on share worthiness. No one knows nothing. The web is a chameleon; it is the river you can never step into twice. You step in with faith and hope you don't get swept away. The best way to develop serious PURPLE COW CONTENT creation chops is to do a lot of bad stuff, learn and get better (lol).
You may get hit by lightening, but integrative and steady is the safer bet. You can also SEE better when you are going slower and then a little faster and then a little faster. Your vision adapts and you scale, your thinking scales. Great article, solid content marketing tips.
Marty Fascinating conversation I understood most of how the old ways sometimes outperform the shinny new ways (not a huge surprise to most Internet markters who test enough).
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