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By Vegasbab, July 29, 2009 7:33 am

Over on twitter and a certain blog, there’s been much debate about a Thought Leader vs. a Practitioner. As the saying goes, “those that can’t DO, teach.”

The ideas and arguments are fine and dandy. Although I’m honestly more on the side of the Practitioners. But, here’s my rub:

People like Brogan and Fitton (aka @Pistachio) should NOT be the people in our industry we look up to. They can’t pinpoint a single thing they’ve done for a major company nor have they duplicated what they’ve done for themselves for a company. Yea, yea, they’re working for big companies like Pepsi and Sony, but that’s like saying, “I worked on BMW films.” Everyone and their sister has; even the guy with the gmail address. Show me the specific piece YOU did for the big company.

The REAL people we should be looking towards are people like Susan from Sharpie, Frank Eliason from Comcast and Paula Berg from Southwest. Names don’t ring a bell? Yea, that’s because they’re the people actually DOING. They’re the people with case studies. They’re the people that started programs from the ground up, are growing and expanding them and oh, yeah, their programs are working.

By all means, please continue to listen to the theories. Me? I’ll be watching what Susan, Frank and Paula are doing. I like taking my cues from them.

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By Vegasbab, July 20, 2009 8:36 pm

I LOVE Augmented Reality. It’s my new favorite bright and shiny object. If you’re not sure what it is, Matt Dickman does the best job explaining it.

Some of the latest ways it’s being used are:

1. Online shopping / Trying on clothes
2. Trying out a new hair cut
3. Finding your way around Wimbledon
4. Finding your way through the New York Subway system
5. If your package fits in a certain sized box
6. Business Card enhancement

I have TONS of ideas on how it can be used for my industry. I’d love to implement a few of them. However, the reality is the rest of the world just isn’t ready. It reminds me a bit of Second Life – Joe Blow doesn’t get it nor does he have the proper technology to use it.

I spent the weekend doing the research. Among other technology impairments, penetration just isn’t there.

But, here’s what is possible… a partner that shares these ideas and excitement with you. But, then does the dirty work and says, “Nope. The ROI just doesn’t pencil out… yet.”

Comments (7)

By Vegasbab, November 4, 2008 10:56 pm

This post was going to be titled, “Why Obama’s Going to Win.” But, alas, it’s been a crazy week and I never had a chance to flush this out like I wanted. Since the election is over and I’m dying, the post is going to stay half-assed. Deal with it.

First, let’s make it really clear: I’m not pro any candidate. As a marketer, I’ve loved watching each campaign’s advertising efforts. For the non-political people out there (and I’m sure there’s a lot), their votes were based off of the advertising campaigns or friends’ opinions vs. taking the time to read the facts. So, whomever had the better advertising campaign was gonna win. Let’s check ‘em out…

Keep in mind this is all based on the advertising I’ve seen. Yep, totally biased post.

When 46% of Americans are using the internet, email or cell phone to get news about the campaign, whether you want to or not, it’s a place you have to be. I really applaud both candidates efforts in social media / next gen advertising, although I think Obama did a more well rounded job. Here’s a couple:

• - Obama has Facebook targeted ads. McCain? Nope. At least none targeted to me. PS- Remember when Facebook let everyone change their name to include “Obama”? Yea, that wasn’t against their Terms and Conditions or anything.
• - Obama had in-gaming ads.
• - Both had twitter streams. Although McCain’s, for the most part, is a bot. One that constantly sends out a crazy amount of links at one time and then is quiet for a few days. Not to mention it’s only following 21 people. Obama’s twitter stream has a much better pace and follows everyone back.
• - Obama used text messaging- text ‘Vote’ to 62262. The original message I received was lame. But, damnit, now they had my phone number. The message I received on Election Day: “People who love their country can change it! Make sure everyone you know votes for Barack today. For voting info call…”

Reality check: ALL social media is still niche. While I don’t advocate TV commercials for my employer, they’re definitely necessary for things like an Election. At the end of the day, this is the way to reach the masses.

• - 99% of the McCain TV commercials I saw were attack ads against Obama. They had a negative connotation. They didn’t allow Americans to empathize with McCain. And they continuously repeated Obama’s name.
• - 95% of the Obama TV commercials focus on Obama. They were not attack ads. They had a positive connotation. The majority of them featured a family and/or a blue-collar worker. Basically, An All American, Apple Pie persona. Americans empathized with these ads. There’s an emotional tie. Based on these ads, Obama seems like a nice guy.

I wish I could find the psych study that compared people’s conscious and unconscious reactions to these ads. Basically, the participants consciously had negative feelings about Obama after seeing McCain’s attack ads. But, subconsciously they had greater negative feelings about McCain. Classic example of the ego vs. the id. We all know “who” typically wins those fights.

Last but not least, there’s branding. While it may be lame, Obama did a fantastic job branding everything with that red, white and blue pepsi-like “logo“. McCain’s logo? Ummm, a general star? Whatever you want to call it, Obama’s freaking logo was EVERYWHERE. The logo was even on posters that didn’t advertise Obama directly, just that people should “Go Vote.” That’s a strong unconscious message that apparently worked. According to Google Insights, the chatter about Obama far outweighed the chatter about Biden, McCain and Palin.

Maybe four years from now people will make educated votes instead of following the masses. Until then, start ramping up those ad campaigns.

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By Vegasbab, October 19, 2008 10:02 pm

David Armano’s newest picture, The Corporate Social Media Curve, made me chuckle as I’ve seen this all too often. However, I’ve discovered an easy way to avoid this curve… educate and excite.

If you have to involve legal folks, old school PR people and IT, then there’s only one way to get everyone on board. If you take the time to educate and excite before shoving something down people’s throats, not only will they be on board, but they will be appreciative and excited about the initiative.

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By Vegasbab, August 3, 2008 4:27 pm

For the last week, I’ve been playing around with WordPress and considering switching. Although, I still can’t decide if I’m ready to mix pleasure (the blog) with business (the freelance stuff).

Several hours later, I’m almost done re-formatting all my posts, but still have the majority of my freelance stuff to import. But here’s the thing:

- WordPress formatting sucks. I still can’t figure out how to make two pictures or videos line up one below the other

- The archive dates on the side of each page are a different font per page! WTF. How in the world do you change that???

- The Wzywig editor is lame. My posts look nothing like what it shows me and I still can’t figure out how to easily change the font.

- The way you embed videos is kinda cool, but it doesn’t allow you to change the bar color. Now that’s just boring and stifles my creativity.

- It’s hard to see which post is unpublished vs. published. In blogger, there’s a giant orange “draft” next to the ones that haven’t been pushed live.

- WordPress still won’t let me incorporate a text box into the design so I can write my disclaimers.I used to think I had a fairly solid understanding of html, but apparently not. Anyway, if anyone has suggestions on how to fix the above, I’d love to hear them.

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By Vegasbab, July 27, 2008 11:20 pm

I got a beta invite to Zivity last night, and per some persuasion, I not only signed up to check it out, but am now writing my thoughts on it.

Zivity is a royalty-based social network for female models and photographers that claims to “empower woman to feel their most beautiful and comfortable.” Zivity Co-Founder, Scott Banister likes to compare the site to a “combination of MySpace, Playboy and American Idol.” It’s been around since about August 2007 and is most similar to Suicide Girls or One Model Place, but could possibly be compared to Hot Fitness Models or Nude Models. Conversely, it’s more high end and a lot cleaner looking than all four. Oh yeah, and you get royalties from the site.

However, besides the high end feel and getting to look at semi- and fully nude woman, I can’t quite figure out why people would pay to be part of the community. Here’s why:

• - Only female models allowed. By doing this, you’ve just cut your network size in half.
• - According to Zivity’s FAQ, after a 31 day trial, members must pay a subscription fee of $10 per month.
• - The “value” and social part of the site centers around “votes”. Each user gets five per month and can buy additional ones for $1 each. The value proposition is that for each vote, the model gets $0.60 and the photographer gets $0.20. Okay, let’s do some math. According to the person who invited me, right now there are 50 models and 50 photographers (100 people total). Each person gets to invite 3 people to join the site. Let’s assume that all one hundred people used all three of their invites. And, let’s assume that all those invited joined. So now we’re at a community with 300 people. Now, let’s assume that all 300 people used one of their five votes for the same model (totally improbable). For this, the “winning” model will make $180 and the “winning” photographer will make $60. If you subtract the $10 subscription fee, the model has now made $170 and the photographer made $50. I’m all about making a few extra bucks, but I don’t see $170/$50 (and most likely, significantly less) being worth the time to cultivate another social network, especially one that’s so closed.
• - Okay, now let’s do some “real” math. The most popular model on the site is Pearl. She’s garnered 1,270 votes. This means she made $762 and her photographer made $252. Not too shabby for a month, but what if she’s been on the site since they launched in August 2007? The next most popular model has 816 votes and most have less than 200. If you’re looking for quick, easy cash, there’s definitely better ways to do it.
• - If I’m a photographer, I’m probably going to place my content in as many touch points as possible. Therefore, as a user, why pay $10 when I can see the same pictures for free on Flickr.

Now, for some of the really stupid things about the site. And by “stupid”, I mean things I don’t like:

• - The initial invite from Zivity gives no indication of who the invite is from. I would have totally deleted the invite had my inviter not IM’d me saying to check my email and Zivity.
• - There’s no way of linking to specific pictures, only photosets (their word for photo album). This is just lame and defeats (a) the ability to share content and (b) any chance of referencing a specific look, feel, etc. that you may like.
• - Same deal for votes. Once you vote, it registers that you voted for that photoset, but not a specific picture. This is dumb as well. If I was a model or photographer, I’d want to know the specific picture that inspired someone to use a vote.
• - While they claim to only allow 19+ years of age onto the site, what’s to stop young ins’ from lying about their age and joining?
• - In addition, the privacy settings are drastically lacking. I envision lots of prevy men (or women) joining the site and no way for members to block them en mass (you can block specific users similar to AIM).

And last but least, a few neutral comments / observations:

• - Last night, I tried “friending” a few models randomly. My inviter was convinced that they’d accept my friendship request as it was in their best interest to increase their network size. So far, not one of the 7 models I friended have accepted. It’s been 24 hours. This leads me to believe the network is very closed (similar to Facebook) or members don’t log in regularly. Either one is not conducive to making $$$.
• - Besides making a quick buck, I’m assuming the value of the site is to pick up work by putting yourself out there. This would be similar to Creative Hotlist for graphic designers. If that is the case, then a member’s profile should include measurements like One Model Place. I’m guessing this was left out so woman could feel “comfortable”.

If you’d like to see other’s thoughts about Zivity, below is a sample:

• - Great, more objective review here
• - What the Twitter community is saying
• - A photographer promotes Zivity on her blog
• - Interested in seeing the inside workings of Zivity? Check out the Zivity YouTube Channel.
• - Interviews of Co-Founders Scott and Cyan Banister on Fox and CBS
• - Official Zivity blog

Zivity’s Presenation at TC40 2007:

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By Vegasbab, July 26, 2008 11:03 am

I like how Patron has taken their “Some Perfection is Debatable” campaign and integrated it into all marketing channels. The website is fun – people love voting, seeing what others think and occasionally commenting about them.

Patron gets it, unlike MGM MIRAGE’s latest UGC campaign. Forty-eight hours in Vegas, in theory, is a cute idea – it’s fun, it’s cool, it provides real value to the customer (win a trip to Vegas) and MGM MIRAGE is attempting to embrace UGC by allowing the user to have control (a big step for a large, archaic corporation). But, without proper marketing, it sucks. In today’s world, whether you love it, hate it or don’t believe in it, traditional advertising is not dead and your interactive campaign probably won’t takeoff without it (and vice versa).

The way people consume media, both traditional and interactive, has changed drastically in the last few years. Your website doesn’t work like it used to and neither does your traditional magazine. People no longer accept one touch point; they demand many. And hey, the consumer is always right, right

So, the question becomes, why has this specific campaign not been rectified already? Because they are unwilling to sync with traditional. They are hard core believers that UGC, social media and viral campaigns simply need to be released into the wild to catch on vs. putting marketing dollars behind it. It’s a poor mindset and what’s causing the campaign to suffer.

If you’re not already on the “integrating interactive and traditional” boat, now is the time to get on… or have fun sinking.

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By Vegasbab, July 20, 2008 8:53 pm

I have to admit that I ride the fence about managing expectations. Sometimes, I think it’s a total bullshit word like engagement media, social media and Web 2.0. But, other days, I’m all for managing expectations. Eight times out of ten it’s very helpful. The ninth time, not so helpful and the tenth time? Total bullshit.

When is managing expectations a good idea? It’s great for pilot programs, new campaigns and making sure team members are working towards the same goal or vision. Expectations also work wonders for Doctor’s visits and when you start a new job. In these situations, if you don’t actively manage expectations, things tend to go bad fast. What about that ninth time? Well, that’s for personal situations. You should never “expect” to have fun when going out. Nor should you “expect” your friends to show up / be ready on time. Same goes for dating. Don’t “expect” to have sex or get a kiss on the first date. Now, don’t get me wrong, “hoping” for all these things is fine and dandy. But, when you start expecting things that are unlikely to happen, all you wind up with is disappoint with a capital D. So far, we have the right time and the wrong time.

Now, on to the fun part… when managing expectations is total BULLSHIT. Managing expectations is useless if setting parameters stifles one’s best. They’re bullshit when people only strive to meet expectations versus giving 100% or more. If you stop a pilot program at its expected goal, that’s just silly. What’s not to say it can’t perform 200% better than what you envisioned?

Managing expectations is bullshit when people use them as scape goats, out of pure laziness or as an excuse to do a half ass job. Moral of the story? Actively work to manage expectations. However, don’t be afraid to exceed those expectations. In fact, your goal should always be to exceed expectations.

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By Vegasbab, June 26, 2008 9:57 pm

Wish I could remember how I managed to stumble upon this site, but alas… Wordle is a fun site allowing you to generate word clouds. The cool/creative part? You get to tweak the layout, colors, fonts, etc. of your word cloud. Want to guess what post I used?

 And for some completely unrelated, added fun…