Tag Archive: Trends

Finding The Signal Amidst The Noise

Earlier this week I had the great opportunity to keynote the first ever Digital World Expo in Las Vegas, NV. Shawn Rorick put together a really solid summit. Digital World Expo was his brain-child and it’s impressive to see how he took an idea from concept all the way to execution. From coordinating the location, finding sponsors, locking down speakers, promoting the event and more, Shawn and his team did a tremendous job of delivering one of the better events that I’ve attended.

On day 1, I took to the stage to kick off and keynote the conference. My slides, sans the video content, can be seen here.

I’m thankful for Shawn’s invitation and those who crawled out of bed on a Monday morning at 8 AM to listen to my thoughts about the future and how to stay relevant over the next decade.

The Rise Of Mocial

At the last iMedia Summit, the speakers and attendees were all a buzz with the term “mocial.”  Which of course is the combination of mobile and social.  Industry veterans, like myself, rolled our eyes.  It’s not the concept we disliked it’s the creation of yet another marketing buzzword.

Buzzword silliness aside, you have to love and respect the influence and impact mobile usage has on social behavior.  I came across this great infographic earlier today that really helps crystalize why mobile has finally ready to rule.

5 Key Interactive Trends To Master In 2010

10 Things I Think I Think About 2010

We all do this. With the year coming to a close we all think forward and prognosticate about what the future will hold. To call 2009 an amazing year for our industry would be an enormous understatement. We’re going to see even more progress in 2010.

So with that, I want to share with you the 10 things I think I think about 2010:

10. Marketers will fail to make mobile work. Every year it seems, publications proclaim the upcoming year, “the year of mobile.” And every year it seems that proclamation fails to live up to the expectations. While I expect consumer use of the mobile web (including apps) to skyrocket, I think we’ll see marketers fall flat on their face as they try to leverage the space. This shouldn’t be new news. Marketers failed to nail, right out of the gate, in-game advertising, social media, and video advertising. We’ve already seen plenty of mis-steps by marketers in the mobile arena. 2010 will be one in which we’ll see a lot of swings and misses.

9. Companies will hire “Social Media Strategists” and other similar types of titles/roles. But, by the end of the year, they’ll realize what a mistake it was to create niche roles, hire specialists, and treat social as something different than “traditional” marketing. Those who can scale horizontally after being hired will succeed. Those who can’t will find themselves without jobs in 2011.

8. Syndication of content will become very important for consumers. Tools like Ping.fm will skyrocket in popularity as people realize how insane and tedious it us to update their statuses across the variety of networks they belong to. People will want to update and sync their statuses from their XBOX 360, twitter account, facebook profile, blog, etc.

7. Netbooks will fail because cell phones will become more than adequate substitutes. Even today, people are using their iPhones more and more on business trips…and leaving their laptops behind. As cell phones become more robust and offer longer battery life, we’re going to see people using cell phones as computers. The key to seeing this happen will be battery life. Features are great. Apps are awesome. But, if your cell phone dies after only 3 hours of use, we’re going to have some major problems.

6. There’s going to be a major backlash against so-called “social media experts.” We’re starting to see some of this taking place now. As more people get wise on the basics of social, they’re going to start demanding better thinking, more accountability, and real results from the people they are paying nearly $100 to see speak.

5. Companies are going to collect talent like never before…even when positions don’t currently exist. Companies like Edelman, AKQA, and Fleishman Hillard are already doing this. These companies will focus on roles and not titles. They will focus on what these individuals can bring to the table, not what bill rate their title can command.

4. Cars will advance dramatically in the areas of personalization and entertainment. Imagine a situation where your car syncs your music, podcasts, news, and the like when you pull into you garage…or better yet with the cloud via satellite.

3. A movie studio will have the balls to release a movie on DVD, on-demand, and in-theater all at the same time. Each medium of course will have it’s own price tag. Consumers will be able to choose how they want to watch the movie.

2. People will redefine the term “friend.” It will evolve to something along the line of “connection.” We don’t really have 5,000 friends; well maybe Brian Solis does…but what we might have are 5,000 connections. Marketers and companies will of course struggle with how to communicate this.

1. With all the focus on cloud computing and linking/syncing accounts, we will see a major security breach of consumer data. People will realize that once you’ve cracked someone’s gmail account, you now have access to their google docs, youTube account, google analytics accounts, etc. Trust me on this one.

Stop Chasing “The Next”

Michael Leis dropped into Minneapolis this week to speak to our agency about interactive trends in 2009.  His presentation was fantastic.  My head was spinning and it’s still reeling a little bit.  He just operates on a different wavelength and thinks about things in a way that forces you to pause.  Often when people give a presentation about trends, they focus on telling you about things that you NEED to be on top of.  They point to tools, technologies, and places that you MUST check out, get involved in, invest in, or purchase.  The message comes across in a way that makes it seem if you don’t invest you will fail.

I remember listening to a vendor, called Wink, in 1999 explaining that 2000 was going to be the year of interactive television.  He explained how people would be able to interact in real time with the shows they were watching.  Like the shirt Rachel is wearing on Friends?  Awesome, with the flick of a finger you can learn more about it and even purchase it.  Folks, it’s 2009 and we still can’t do that :)  We’re getting closer to that experience, but it’s a long way off.  I guess that trend was wrong.  Can you imagine if we advised BMW, our client at the time, to invest in interactive television instead of funding BMW Films?

Michael really hit on the point that you need to stop chasing what’s next.  It’s not about the next Facebook.  Or the next YouTube.  Or even, the next iPhone.  Just stop.  The answers aren’t there.  If you are always chasing the next bright shiny object, you’ll never get any traction.  There’s an old line that’s been used and reused thousands of times by thousands of people: “The best way to predict the future is to invent it.” On many levels this is true. Nike wasn’t chasing the next thing when they created Nike+. Nike simply created the next thing. Think about it. Nike could have partnered with Facebook or Google directly. They could have worked with cell phone companies to make the technology work on existing hardware and the cellular networks. Instead, the decided that the next big trend was something they were going to create. It was bold. It was beautiful. And it’s successful.

This isn’t to say we should ignore trends. Trends are very important. We should monitor trends. We should evaluate them. We should invest in the RIGHT ones, not everyone. Just because your competitor is on Twitter, doesn’t mean you need to be. You don’t necessarily need a widget, iPhone app, or a presence on Tivo. You might. But, you shouldn’t invest in those places just because they’re new, under leveraged, and somewhat fertile ground.

2009 is feeling a lot like 2000 to me. It feels like everyone is dumping their money online and hoping for a big bang. While I applaud the companies that are finally realizing the power of the interactive medium, I also need to caution them that they need to be focused on their business problems and not what AdAge says they need to do.

This year stop looking for the next big thing and start focusing on results.

About
Head of Social Media at Walgreens. Interactive marketer, innovator, boat rocker, continuous learner, movie lover, risk taker, dad and all around good guy. I'm always up for a spirited conversation. These are my thoughts and ramblings, not those of my employer.
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