The Kmiec Ramblings

Tag Archive: Twitter

The Case For The Return On Amazing

Written on January 26, 2012 by Adam Kmiec in Marketing & Advertising, Walgreens

Over the past few days I attended the Social Commerce Strategies conference in Las Vegas, NV. Honestly, it was one of the best organized conferences I’ve attended. Well done to the team putting together the entire event.

I had the opportunity to connect with a wide range of organizations looking to turn social into a revenue generator. We heard from Dell, Coke, Travelocity, Whirlpool, GNC, Shop Igniter, Wal-Mart Labs and a host of others. The following is a summation of key take-aways that spanned the multiple presentations, panels and conversations that took place:

Social is an accelerator, not a direct generator: This was a big theme and something the Wal-Mart Labs championed. Social helps you make the cash register ring faster and with greater impact, but the mistake many organizations make is treating it like it’s own revenue channel. This was akin to early eCommerce websites, where the online experience was completely separate from the in-store experience. But, as those sites evolved, the connection between online and store became greater. Social should be considered the same way.
Predictive Analysis: Very impressive presentation from the Wal-Mart labs team. They believe that they can predict an online customer’s behavior with 90%+ accuracy based on the social graph data (likes, dislikes, interests, what they’ve shared, etc.) and shopping history. ShoppyCat, though low in “usage” is considered a success by the labs team because of the increased data acquired and it’s impact on future shopping experiences on WalMart.com.
The Hunt For Social Signals: Social offers us signals that should guide our decisions. What someone does in social leaves a digital fingerprint. But, those finger prints are often ignored because they seem small in the grand scheme of things and we’re usually focused on large social networks like Facebook and Twitter. But, when we look beyond those large networks, we start to see signals, a la cookies, that can help us guide what content to show and when.
Expressions over Impressions: A near continuation of #3, but people are now leveraging social to express themselves. Pinterest is a great example of this. The photos they pin are an expression and representation of the user. The best social experiences enable customers to express themselves. Coke referenced several initiatives for their Vitamin Water brand where they’re experimenting with this concept…some have worked and others not so much. I think Beauty and Photo for Walgreens have huge opportunity under this thinking.
Pay To Play: As social networks look to monetize and in some cases start delivering shareholder value (e.g. Google+) the ability to simply build on the backs of these networks organically is becoming harder and harder. A brand will either need to invest in complimentary advertising to make people aware of their initiative or invest in better and more compelling experiences. Both cost incremental dollars.
Social + Search = Gold Mine: Everyone agrees this is future. Social and search will continue integrating to provide a better and more personal set of search engine results. Brands will need to make decisions based on perceived intent. For example, if I search Walgreens Facebook Promotion, I should be driving someone to Facebook, not Walgreens.com. It seems basic and simple, but few brands are doing this. With only limited dollars to go around, it’s tough to justify driving someone to your Facebook page where the instant purchase opportunity is low. The efforts by Google+, in this area, will be interesting to watch. The prevailing thought and said by the head of social at Whirlpool was, “start thinking about your Google+ strategy and working closer with Google than you ever have before. If you don’t you’ll end up far behind.”

I presented on both a panel and a session called The Case For The Return on Amazing. The slides can be found here:

The Case For The Return On Amazing

View more presentations from Adam Kmiec

The video from slide 44 can be seen here:

All in all a good trip with lots of knowledge exchanged.

One think I did want to call out, since it came up in a lot of the offline conversations is that “tinkering” could be the next big thing for large organizations. Companies like Dell and Wal-Mart have teams dedicated to the idea of tinkering. What’s tinkering? It’s the concept of giving a team a problem, they in turn “tinker” and generate ideas. The ideas are rapidly prototype and thrust into social channels for immediate feedback. Bad ideas are dropped. Good ideas stick. And great ideas become something bigger. It’s innovation the way it should be…like a startup!

Tags: Big Ideas, Facebook, Pinterest, Social Media, Twitter

Fortune Favors The Brave

Written on January 13, 2012 by Adam Kmiec in Marketing & Advertising, Walgreens

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Audaces fortuna iuvat – that’s latin for “Fortune Favors The Brave” or sometimes depending on the use and interpretation “Fortune Favors The Bold.” Over the years it’s been the rallying cry of several organizations and it’s something I adopted as a mindset years ago. Too often, we shirk from being bold, brave and taking risks. And why not? When a risk goes wrong, everyone looks for someone to point the finger at. I’ve always been ok with that approach. I like being accountable for my decisions. And often, they are bold, they are brave and they are risky. But, they are never ill-informed or not grounded in insights. See, that’s the key to being bold. Don’t be bold to be bold – be bold because your gut and your insights are supporting your decisions.

As I was writing this post, I came across this great post from Kathi Kruse, titled, “The Awesome Power of Bravery in Social Media.” It’s a great read, and not just because she leads with a timely quote from Richard Branson:

The brave may not live forever but the cautious do not live at all!

Yesterday, we launched a very innovative, first of its kind social media program. It was a risky program that some have referred to as a war. It’s often easy to play armchair strategist without knowing the goal, the objectives, the strategy or the final campaign metrics. I knew when I recommended this program and when we launched it, that the social pseudo-experts would jump all over it. I knew we’d hear that you shouldn’t “sling mud.” I knew social meda “purists” would argue you shouldn’t pay for “social media.” There were definitely potential downsides and less than 10% of all the conversation came from those dissenters. That 10% number isn’t made up. You can do a quick pull of the hashtag #ILoveWalgreens certainly demonstrates a more than 10 to 1 ratio of positive to negative opinions. That ratio was also validated by 2 of our social media monitoring tools. Some of my favorite tweets can be found here.

Certainly, the program wasn’t perfect. No campaign is. We learned a lot. We learned how to improve. We learned what worked. I also learned, what we’ve always known in this business…everyone thinks they know more than you do! That’s ok. It comes with the territory. As Richard Branson said, “The brave may not live forever but the cautious do not live at all!” So long as empowered to do so, I’ll keep blazing new paths, new trails, rocking boats and leveraging real insights to drive smart risky decisions.

Tags: Risk, Social Media, Twitter, Walgreens

Klout And Chevy Hooked Me Up With A Chevy Volt

Written on September 8, 2011 by Adam Kmiec in Marketing & Advertising

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I’m a BMW guy. Always have been. Always will. Once turned down a job to work with Audi’s interactive agency because I couldn’t trade-in my BMW 530 for an Audi. Brand loyal and stubborn. If anyone was going to offer me a Klout Perk or ask me to test drive a new car, it should have been BMW. I begged BMW and their agency to do this in 2008. Sadly, I never even heard from them. Might help explain why they no longer have the business…but, I digress. I’ve also been critical of Klout. I think what they’re trying to do is ambitious and I applaud their efforts, but I still think their scoring model is not reflective of true influence.

Talk about an intro. Well, with all the above stated, you could imagine my surprise when I received a Klout notification via twitter and email that I had been granted a perk from Chevy. I was even more surprised when I learned that Chevy would be giving me a new Chevy Volt to play with for 3 days, as part of their Driving The Midwest campaign. My Klout Perk read:

“The Chevrolet Volt is Yours to Drive
Klout, Chevrolet and DrivingtheMidwest.com invite you to be one of the first consumers to get behind the wheel of the all-electric Chevrolet Volt. Participants will receive a $50 gift card and an awesome driving experience which combines the efficiency and benefits of an electric car with the long-range capabilities of a traditional gasoline vehicle.”

I want to pause for a second and I think its important to talk about this whole program through two critical lenses:

The Klout Experience
The Chevy Volt Experience

Each of these is a separate, but related part of the entire experience.

The Klout Experience
Honestly, really solid. Their notifications via twitter and email got me to click and learn more. After seeing how awesome of a perk this was, I did start connecting some other social networks in an attempt to increase my Klout score and earn other perks. Perks were a great motivator to link and sync more accounts…and in doing so, provide more information about me, to Klout. The folks at Klout may not have mastered measuring influence, but they certainly are mastering gameification. The entire acceptance process of the Perk was also simple. Two clicks, if I recall, is all it took.

While the process of earning, accepting and ultimately redeeming a Perk was simple, I still question the value of Klout. Think about this for a second. I’m not influential about cars. I don’t have car enthusiasts in my network. Nearly everyone I know and am connected to has a foreign car. Add into the mix, that I’m not a fan of hybrid cars…kinda hard to be be when you’re a BMW enthusiast, and you have to start to scratching your head. Now, I will say, I have been a Chevy car owner before. Around 2005 I was a Chevy Malibu owner. It was a great car. Prior to that car I owned a Suzuki Grand Vitara and a Toyota MR2. After that car it was a BMW 530i and the BMW 328i I currently own. I’m giving you this background, because I don’t understand how it is I “qualified” to earn a Perk for a Chevy Volt. There’s no doubt a cool factor in being selected, but as a marketer, I hesitate about working with Klout.

The Chevy Volt Experience
The first thing I have to say is what a cool car. Seriously. It’s fun. It has oomph (is that a technical term?) that other hybrids lack. Having driven the Honda Insight and the Toyota Prius, I can say there’s simply no comparison. The Chevy Volt is a car, the other two are just go karts masquerading as cars. I was impressed with the style of the Volt. The exterior is striking and the interior has refinements that are usually saved for luxury cars. For example, not only is their a stylish, easy to read heads up display, but the center console has a large full featured touch screen display that basically controls the entire car. Having used BMW’s iDrive, I can tell you the usability experts at Chevy nailed this. The menus are intuitive, the iconography clear, the screen responsive and they’ve minimized the steps you need to accomplish a task. In most instances, I found myself needing only 3 taps.

There were some oddities though, that I need to call out. Leather seats? Check! Heated, leather seats? Check! Awesome, right? But, the seat adjustment options were all manual and quite difficult to use. The key fob was a mixed bag as well. It had remote start capabilities and didn’t need to leave your pocket to start the car. But, there was no keyless entry; yes, that means you have to use the fob to unlock the car by pressing a button. Even Toyota offers full comfort access where the fob never has to leave your pocket to open the door or start the car. Also, and granted this sounds like a nitpick, but I was stunned the car didn’t come with a moonroof. It just seemed like it would be such a great fit.

The handling was better than expected. Seriously. The steering was tight and responsive. I thought I’d feel every bump, but I didn’t. Honestly, when you consider how bad Chicago’s streets and highways are, this was a real accomplishment.

Ok, so what didn’t I like about the Volt? I think there’s really 5 big things I can point to; 4 of them Chevy could/can control and the other is just life.

The seats were uncomfortable. I know they’re bucket seats, but even a 30 minute drive left my back and butt sore. They’re leather and they’re heated. But, they feel like a slab of marble.
The view through the back of the car was narrow and difficult. There’s a split in the hatchback window that makes seeing out the back nearly impossible.
Keeping with #2, the mirrors are either strangely placed or too small. No matter how I adjusted them, I never felt like I could actually see to the left or the right.
The Volt is a hybrid. To really maximize the value of the Volt you need to be driving the car on electric power. Simple in theory. But, to fully charge the car takes roughly 10 hours. And, unless you live in a house or have an apartment/condo that has indoor/covered parking with charging stations, you’ll never be able to take advantage of the Volt’s amazing electric performance. In my case, I have to park on the street. That doesn’t exactly leave a lot of options for charging the car. I will say this, charging the car, when possible, is easy. You simply plug a cable that looks like an extension cord into an outlet with one end and into the car with the other. Simple. There’s really nothing Chevy can do about this. Even if they found better batteries, you’d still have the same plugin challenge.
Lastly, the cost. Yowza. The model I drove, ran roughly $45,000. To put that into perspective…that’s more than a BMW 335i Diesel. It’s more than a lot of cars. Yes, I know we’re talking about two different mindsets for car owners, two different demographics, two different types of cars, etc. But, still…

I liked my Chevy Volt experience. Honestly, I wish the experience lasted more than 3 days. In a perfect world, I would have loved 10 days with the car. It would have given me at least 1 weekend to take the car on a long drive and really put it through its paces. A car like the Volt would put Chevy into my consideration set if I was in the market for a new car, but it’s unlikely that the Volt, priced at $45,000 would every sway me from purchasing a BMW 1 or 3 Series. That’s just being honest. That said, I’d definitely recommend the Volt any person thinking about a new car.

I’m thankful to the folks at Chevy, Klout and their partners for letting me enjoy the Volt. It was fun, entertaining and certainly a unique experience.

Tags: Chevy, Influencers, Klout, Social Media, Twitter

Instagram Is Suffering From A Case Of Twitter

Written on August 14, 2011 by Adam Kmiec in Marketing & Advertising

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99 times out of 100 I agree with Gizmodo. Their writing, insights and thought leadership are usually spot on. But, in a recent article titled, “Cut It Out Instagram Cheaters!” they’re definitely not seeing the forest for the trees. Nearly 2 years ago I wrote the following regarding Twitter’s business model:

“The problem with Twitter remains it has never innovated. All of the innovation has come through acquisition (eg Summize) or by third party products (eg Tweetdeck). For a company focused on the real time web, they certainly are quite glacial in their innovation. I think people will become bored by Twitter. Well, many people are, as evident by the fact 60% of people who create an account post once and never come back. 1 Billion? I just don’t see it.”

Fast forward to today and I was spot on.

Twitter acquired Tweetdeck and Atebits to improve the app based twitter experience
While the number of new accounts has increased, my 60/40 ratio has held true and actually gotten worse for twitter
Google+ launched and has already siphoned off a large portion of twitter’s base

Mat Honan, who wrote the Gizmodo piece does a GREAT job of outlining ALL of Instagram’s MANY shortfalls. Among them:

Instagram does not have a web-upload option. It barely has a website. It’s entirely mobile, and photos can only be sought-out through the app. Sure, each photo generates its own URL, but you can only get that URL if the photo is posted on another service like Facebook.

Given the overall tone of this post, you’d think I wasn’t a fan of Instagram. Quite the contrary, I LOVE Instagram. I’ve recommended Instagram to and/or helped signup no less than 50 people. I even tried to pitch Instragram on partnering with us at Walgreens…they declined, indicated they were not doing partnerships, and referred me to their API documentation. Bummer.

I think they’ve built a great mobile app. But, that’s what it is right now…an app. Not a platform. Not a network. An app. So long as it remains just an app with an API, the innovation will come from other hungrier and more innovative developers. For example:

Postagram: Let’s you create postcards out of your Instagram photos.

Blurb: Let’s you create keepsake books from your Instagram photos.

I think what Mat is really frustrated over though are the clones/competitors that are popping up and creating Instagram like tools that aren’t built on the Instagram API and not germain to the “Insta” nature of Instagram. For example Daniel Box’s GREAT Photoshop Actionsthat let you recreate the Instagram experience without ever using their app.

This photo, for example was taken on a DSLR (Nikon D700) and then processed using Daniel’s Photoshop Action. I chose the Earlybird filter.

I think this type of innovation is a good thing. Remember, Smartphones are still less than 40% of the market and on top of that Instagram ONLY works on the iPhone.

As Mat says in his article, “There is obviously no right way to Instagram. You use it for what you use it for.” So long as Instagram continues to take a snail’s speed approach to innovation, other developers will bring to market features that fill in the gaps Instagram is creating. I’m actually bummed by it all. I love Instagram. As an avid photographer I can see so much potential. It’s disheartening to see them act more like IBM and less like a startup. Instagram by design is supposed to be social, yet how they use social media to improve the product is decidedly unsocial.

Tags: Gizmodo, Instagram, Photography, Twitter

September 11th – Nearly 10 Years Later

Written on May 2, 2011 by Adam Kmiec in News

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On the morning of September 11, 2011 I boarded a Southwest flight from Midway airport with my great friend and colleague Reed Roussel. We were both headed to Ft. Knox Kentucky for a full day worth of meetings with our United States Army client. When we landed in Kentucky, the first plane had already met its fate by flying directly into the twin towers.

We were oblivious to everything that had transpired as we hopped into our Enterprise rental car and started the 45 minute trek to Ft. Knox. During the ride over, little did we know, plane #2 had also crashed. This was 2001 and cell phones weren’t exactly in high use. The behavior of having it practically glued to your hand just didn’t exist. I did notice a call from my wife and Reed noticed a call from his mom, but we ignored them both. They were well aware of the tragedy and were trying to reach us to make sure we were both OK.

When we arrived at the post, there was something off. The vibe was all wrong. An hour into our visit (55 minutes of which were spent waiting for the client) we finally learned from our client that 2 planes had flown into the twin towers and it was to our advantage that we leave the post immediately. Why? Because, in about 10 minutes the post would be on lock down and all non-military personnel would be placed “under suspicion.” To be honest, we were still confused about the situation, but we had no desire to be locked up on the post.

Reed and I hopped in the car, called the airline, learned all flights were canceled, then called Enterprise and explained we would not be returning the car to the airport. Instead, we would be driving to Chicago and returning it there. We started the journey from Ft. Knox to Chicago. The roads were strangely empty. Keep in mind, at this point, while the rest of the country was transfixed to the television coverage, we hadn’t seen anything. With no smartphones, our only real option was the radio. The irony, was, the only radio station that was coming through was the one carrying Howard Stern. For the next 2 hours we listened to Howard Stern. He was our connection to the outside world and was the one who brought us up to speed on what had happened. It wasn’t till we stopped for lunch, that we saw our first visual. We were awe struck. Stunned. It’s hard to put into words the emotions running thorough me. I’m a born and raised New Yorker; this hit hard.

10 years ago, I learned about 9/11 via the radio. I learned about operation Desert Storm via television. When Sadam Hussein was captured, I learned about it via the web. Last night, I learned about death of Osama Bin Laden via text message first, then Twitter. The text message I received instructed me to check out Twitter, not turn on the TV. After reading the news, I found a TV and saw the president’s speech. As I watched his delivery, I couldn’t help but think about how we’ve evolved as a society…how our sharing has changed…how our means for connection have evolved. We operate in a real time and always on demand society. I think this was the first real moment where that wasn’t just rhetoric, for me, but a truly shared experience.

Tags: Culture, Sharing, Texting, Twitter

Stronger Together Than We Are Apart

Written on December 21, 2010 by Adam Kmiec in Marketing & Advertising, Misc.

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Earlier today, I stumbled on to a great blog authored by Rachelle. It’s amazing who pops up into your twitter stream. Some days, I’m literally in awe of the people I’m introduced to, virtually. The first thing that drew me in to her blog was the very first post, simply titled, “What Is Marriage?”

Rachelle’s writing is nothing short of witty, fun and honest. There’s a certain amount of Penelope Trunk in her. And you all know how much I love Penelope Trunk. Her post was nothing short of brilliant. How do I know this? Because, to me, she’s captured the essence of what many of us struggle to say when we get engaged. There are two wonderful passages that I feel compelled to share.

Because at the end of the day, I finally have tasted what real love is and have not felt the desire to ask myself “Is there someone better out there?” Because there isn’t. He’s perfect… for me. I’ve never been a better me since I met him. And I want that to continue, because oh baby, it’s so just the beginning. (And if you knew me, you’d know that I spent my entire life looking for something better. The fact that I’ve found it is incredible.)

and

We bicker and argue, and we’ve fought, but we hate it. We hate upsetting the other. It never lasts. And no, we’ve never been to bed upset at one another. We don’t just say we’re sorry, afterwards either. We correct the mistakes we each made and explain each other.

The reason they stick out to me is because they hit on three very important inter-related characteristics of successful relationships (business and personal):

Passion: Without it, why are we doing what we’re doing? Passion gets you out of bed in the morning after a late night. Passion inspires you to order flowers just because. Passion pushes you forward to succeed, because you won’t tolerate less than the best. And yes, passion, is what keeps you engaged (pun intended).
Satisfaction: There’s a point in a relationship where you stop looking, stop taking that call from the recruiter, stop wondering if “this” is right. You have a certain satisfaction that keeps you excited, enticed, content and fulfilled. It’s the glow that people see on a face right after you get engaged or get promoted, that I’m talking about. There’s the certain grin, like a cheshire cat, that makes the world say, “I want what she/he has.”
Effort: I remember thinking that arguments were a bad thing. After all you only argue, when you don’t agree. And if you don’t agree on a lot of things, you shouldn’t be together right? One of my mentors instilled a bit of wisdom on me that I carry forward every day: she said, “it’s ok to disagree. In fact, I encourage it. Be the devil’s advocate. Probe. Question. Challenge. But, you’ll never be able to do any of it successfully if you philosophically disagree on what you’re really trying to do.” Her point was that if you both want the same thing at a big picture level, the smaller disagreements become irrelevant because you’ll find a way to make each other happy. Funny, that it takes business advice to shine a light on personal relationship advice. I think Rachelle really hit on something when she said, “We correct the mistakes we each made and explain each other.” Man, how often do we overlook this? The explain part is the smoking gun. You need to be able to explain why something was a mistake, what the impact was, how it made you feel, etc. Otherwise, people are just reacting at a surface level.

You really should read the entire post, I’ve re-read it several times and I’ve come to the conclusion that her fiance is one hell of a lucky guy. I tip my cap to both of them.

The name of this post actually comes from an exchange Rachelle and I had on twitter. She stated that with regards to arguing, a big reason why their relationship works is because they are stronger together than they are apart. Think about that the next time a recruiter calls or an old boyfriend appears – the grass isn’t always greener. What you may find is that everything you were looking for was already there.

Tags: Jon Hunting, Marriage, Relationships, Twitter

Why Should I Follow Your Business?

Written on August 31, 2010 by Adam Kmiec in Marketing & Advertising

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There are days when The Onion just nails it. Yesterday they posted an article titled, “Local Fabric Store Urges You To Check Them Out On Twitter.”

The sarcasm of the article hits on the idea that every company these days seems to be asking you to follow them on Facebook and Twitter. Restaurants, dry cleaners, grocery stores and others are posting signs in their windows that let customers know they have a presence on Facbook and Twitter.

In theory that’s great. I love seeing business realize the need to create awareness around their social real-estate. Unfortunately, too many companies simply think if they create Facebook and Twitter accounts, they’ll magically get followers. As a marketer first and an interactive practioner second, I can tell you that offline marketing and awareness tools are critical to driving social success.

Ok, off the soap box. Here’s the thing that’s missing. That sign in the window is a great first step, but rarely are the reasons why I should follow you included. Think about it. Why am I going to seek you out on Facebook or Twitter if I don’t know what I’m going to get from it? It just doesn’t make sense.

We need to be smarter about our offline marketing. The real magic starts to happen in the social space, when our offline marketing is working hard to support our online initiatives. Dare I say…our marketing needs to be more integrated? I know that’s a marketing buzzword, but I think you can see in this case, why it’s so important.

I’d love to see examples you’ve come across of companies doing it right.

Tags: Facebook, Integrated Marketing, Signage, Social Media, The Onion, Twitter

Choosing Communication Options

Written on June 28, 2010 by Adam Kmiec in Marketing & Advertising

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I’ve been a horrendous communicator lately. I’ve been using twitter direct messages when an email would be better. I’ve been using text messages when a phone call would be faster and offer clearer communication. I’ve opted to use Google Chat when a face to face exchange would be more productive. For a person that’s in the communications business, I deserve an “F” in how well I’ve been communicating.

You know what the problem is? There’s simply too many tools and platforms out there. We’ve gotten lazy and instead of using the right platform for the right message for the right person, we simply use the platform/tool we’re currently spending time in. Would it really be that hard to open up another tab and switch from Facebook to email? Or from email to Google Chat? Of course not. But, many times we don’t.

The tool(s) doesn’t make you a better communicator. The tool enables you to communicate. It’s a means to an end. It carries the message. And as we all know there’s a big difference in receiving a hand written thank you note an emailed one. If you want to be a better communicator, don’t just rely on what the message is…think about how you’re distributing it. Consider your audience and your intent. In short, simply pause and give some prudent thought before you simply decide to video chat your client while you’re wearing only a pair of shorts…because they were online at the same time. I think you’ll appreciate it and your client will as well.

Tags: Communication, Facebook, Google, Google Chat, SMS, Twitter

It’s All About Controlling Access

Written on April 12, 2010 by Adam Kmiec in Marketing & Advertising

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Marketing is not advertising. Marketing is not sales. However, marketing does involve both advertising and sales. There was a time when the company had the product. They marketed the product through advertising and that lead to sales. Simple, right?

But, then something strange started to happen. Companies started to think about “access” as a conduit from consumer/customer to sale of the “product.” We see this all the time when we’re watching NBC or another network, and see an ad for a show that’s on NBC. We see this all the time when we see the Sunday circular for Target and it’s promoting their private label brand, Archer Farms. We see it all the time when we see “house” ads on a website; for example ads for the Google Nexus One on Google. These were expected and frankly, vanilla, exploitations of

And now all of a sudden we’re seeing companies rethink how to make a sale, but controlling access. We’re all familiar with the iTunes/App store from Apple or the Kindle store from Amazon. We’re all also familiar with how free ranging access to the movies via the web and other services like NetFlix killed Blockbuster. Blockbuster was simply too slow to regain controls of the access. They lost control of it and essentially moves into oblivion.

Companies are now focusing heavily on getting that first mover advantage into controlling access. Google bought AdMob. Apple is introducing iAds. And now, Twitter just bought Atebits, the company who makes the popular Twitter client, Tweetie. All of these decisions were about controlling access.

The Twitter acquisition has really pissed off a lot of people in the development community. After all it was the development community that propelled Twitter forward. Twitter was so slow and seemingly unable to innovate. But, the development community filled the void. Tools like Seesmic, Tweetdeck, Summize and of course Tweetie filled the void users had and ultimately helped Twitter grow. The big part of the Tweetie acqusition is that Twitter will be reducing the cost of the app from $2.99 to FREE. Talk about making that app accessible and by making it accessible they will be feeding and controlling the pipeline of people joining and using Twitter.

It’s not going to be about having a killer product anymore. It’s going to be about controlling the access to that product. Cable companies have known this for years and I think it’s a major reason why Comcast purchased NBC/Universal. No longer will they just control access to every channel (aka product), but they’ll also be controlling the actual product now. Scary or cool?

The jury is still out on that one, but there’s one thing I think we know is true. We’re going to see a lot more of this. Companies who want to stay on top will be looking to ensure they’re controlling access to the product.

Tags: Apple, Business Models, Google, Twitter

Follow Our CMO

Written on April 6, 2010 by Adam Kmiec in Marketing & Advertising

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I came across this the other day on Michigan Avenue in downtown Chicago. It struck me and obviously made me pause. I’ve seen other brands integrate calls to action for social into their in-store signage and point of sale collateral. But, I’ve yet to see anything this large and in your face.

I love the direction that Express is taking, but I think they made a minor mistake. Does the average customer know what a CMO is or who the CMO is? I don’t think so. But, people know what a president, vice president, stylist or designer are.

When you consider they’re in the fashion business, I thin they’ve missed an opportunity. What do you think?

Tags: Express, Facebook, Signage, Social Media, Twitter