Bloody social media

So, I've just seen this new flavors.me thing and because I'm cool and awesome and also awesomely cool I wanted to put all my social profiles in their so my Mum can keep track of how cool I am all in one place. 


Problem being, it appears my blog is exceptionally low in both quality and quantity so what better reason to update it than a post about quite literally nothing other than perhaps how this bloody social media has made us all a bunch of people who share stuff, some of it is superb, some of it is genuinely inspiring and some of it is quite literally dross. 


Point being, quite literally that. I've created a post of dross so, if someone were to find me on flavors.me they'd see the awesome range of social content I create and be inspired to share, create, converse and all that other social stuff. 


Love it. 

The CIO, the orange button or the TV - who's most influential?

Being so close to the cutting edge (there are scratches on my big toe - that's how close) I was watching BBC Click this morning (yes at 06:50 on BBC1 I'm afraid) and they ran a feature about apps on browsers and had a few examples of those available on chrome...

15 hours later I had myself a look and I thought the 'blog it' by blogger was pretty neat... I then thought to myself well will it actually make me blog any more frequently.The results of the test say yes but I'm guessing you say the same about anything tried once its the fact I know its not going to happen again for another few months that makes the voice in my head say 'NO it will not!'

Be that as it may, I did find the BBH Labs post on innovation in agencies both interesting and relevant so thought I'd use the new little button in my browser to share it...

The agency I currently work at has a CIO, he's name checked in the blog and is a thouroughly nice and amazingly intelligent chap. In addition to that I'd say my sample of one thinks having someone in that role brings a hell of a lot to the agency. From personal experience its been in points 3 and 5 but I'm sure those with a closer or more regular interactions would say he delivers on all counts so, for what its worth yes a good agency (or any agency that wants to be good) does really need a CIO.

Exploring The Edges: On Innovation In Agencies « BBH Labs

but its unlikely he or the nice orange button in the corner of my browser will make me blog more consistently.

So shall I tell you what hit me more than anything today?

TV is an awesome and influential communications channel. Ok it may be dross, and if you've stayed here this long you're probably my wife or brother but the only reason I've spent 30 minutes this evening mucking about on the chrome webstore and typing this is due to 30" of TV coverage at an ungodly hour this morning - 30 seconds of TV coverage for 30 minutes of real world interaction is a great ratio and that's why TV is still awesome!

Why google wins

Funny, I had completely neglected my wee blog, I'd go as far saying I forgot I ever started one, then today by pure coincidence I was chatting with a buddy about google and facebook... bit if a who would win Superman or King Kong type conversation and I was nicely reminded of the sheer scale of toys google gives me to play with on my own terms.

I thought I'd check them out and needless to say there are a good 6 or 7 tools above I use on a regular basis and a further 10 or so I could and should be using more.

Another good thing about the G-bomb? I'm writing a blog that nobody will read and its not going to end up in my newsfeed and have everyone thinking what is he talking about... because I'm not really talking about anything.

Probably why I don't update a blog very often eh?

Mobile Trends 2020

Check out this SlideShare Presentation I think it’s awesome. It pulls together a few bullets from 40+ mobile luminaries with cooler job titles than my own. Obviously Rudy De Waele forgot to get in touch with me but that can be forgiven, given my exceptional talent for spotting trends once they've been spotted elsewhere I thought I'd summarise a few of the key themes from the deck and what the world of mobile may deliver over the coming years… most important is battery power!

Mobile Trends 2020

Handsets – Cheaper than they are now, more powerful than they are now. There will be more OEMs, tiger markets coming into bloom and HTC taking a bigger piece of the pie. Oh... and Apple still doing what they do! Basically major democratisation of the handset world with the smart v feature phone splits being 80/20 in favour of smart phones

Connectivity – More of it and a lot more objects connected. Think of fridges, bathroom scales, irons and of course your dog. All talking to you, your phone and of course each other. On a couple of occasions it mentions objects creating more data than the individuals that use them!

Paying for Content - the consistent theme here is inconsistency! Discussed throughout mainly people alluding to more content being paid for but others saying nobody will pay for mobile content. Possibly content being paid for once but delivered/consumed across multiple devices as part of the transaction (tv, laptop, mobiles and tablets). This is something I see happening and expect it to be on the Rupert Radar very soon!

Data Ownership/Storage – With such an increase in connectivity there will be more data than anyone can handle so much so we’ll want and need to be the masters of our own data which will mean a whole new need for data storage solutions and perhaps us selling the storage

Universal wi-fi – Whether it’s propped up by the tax payer, an advertiser funded model or simply a nice altruistic offering from the corporate world the prospect of having wi-fi literally everywhere, or at least in major conurbations is great… but will it work? Or will I continue to get bumped from one BT openZone to the next?

Internet browsing – Will surpass that off desktop internet browsing within the next few years, according to Mary Meeker it will be 2014 and some a little sooner but either way we’re looking at a significant shift in how people consume content and on what devices in the mid term future.

Advertising – A thread running throughout is mobile starting to take a significant chunk of advertising budget and even challenging digital budgets in the near future. This could happen but I guess that’s more likely when the distinction between the two is less. I expect the near future to be about

Augmented Reality – Will it become the norm? Some say it will… the more LBS opportunities there are for consumers I’d expect the more opportunities for augmented reality applications so makes sense to me (and the rest people that know what they’re talking about too).

Payments – It’s been growing for a while, largely driven by apps and ring tones but there is now ‘proper’ purchasing going on, next week we’ll be buying toasters and then next year it will be cars. 2020 – houses?

Battery Power – The most useful of these developments, batteries that match the power needs of the phone. I’m charging my Desire once maybe twice a day to power all the damn browsing I’ve lived the past 10 years without and to replace the Ipod’s & MP3’s etc..

Disconnect – I love this theme, again it comes up at least 4 times. So much connectivity that people just wants to, well, disconnect. Think foursquare and "@ off the grid" but you have to travel to it, potentially pay for it and it becomes a pass time of those that can afford to disconnect… maybe not that drastic but there will be value in not being connected... and with that I'm out.

View more presentations from Rudy De Waele.

Its local, direct and personal. I love foursquare for marketing!

Any one that follows me on twitter or is a facebook buddy will know I'm a regular at the Sainsbury's on Clapham Road Bedford or that I frequent the Luscious Fruit Bar on Lime Walk (both historical Bedford monuments for those not in the know), the reason for this phenomenal geographical commentary that allows mere mortals to feel they are in the presence of greatness is the wonderful little social network/game of foursquare.

I'll be honest, I'm not sure the real purpose of this post other than to say I think its a cool service which, when used correctly should enable companies to engage really well with their potential customers at a local level with a direct communication that ilicits a response for very little expense on behalf of the business - a retail holy grail?

Last week Domino's credited its use of foursquare with increasing pre tax profits by 29% (along with a range of other social media initiatives) which alone is an excellent example of a UK organisation taking advantage of location based digital integration but combined with the rest of their social mix makes for some really interesting reading (and a good case study for a few agencies I suspect!)

There is some good analysis of Domino's social activity here - Wavematrix

Another thing I like specifically about foursquare is its seemless integration with facebook and twitter rather than being a rival it syncs superbly and I've a nice little

piece of personal experience on this from a few weeks back. I decided to treat the wonderful Mrs Dutch to a wild night out and went to see Predators at my local Cineworld. Being the social media pioneer I am I let the world know I was there and what film I was going to see with my foursquare sync to twitter... the next day I was tweeted by cineworld asking me what I thought of the film...

I'm still waiting on the years supply of free cinema tickets for my insightful response but in the mean time I'll revel in the warm glow generated by a local, relevant and direct communication I had with a national brand.

For those more interested in making foursquare work for their business there are 7 Quick Steps to Foursquare Marketing here because its clear I've not given up much in this post... I just think its cool and has a lot of potential!

Google Discontinues Nexus One - A Sign Android Is Really Here?

Quite a few headlines around this one today but I'm not sure the implications of the news are as big as some may suggest. My view, for what its worth (that much? Why thank you!) is google knows that android has seriously taken off and as a result they don't need to waste the time and money themselves in supporting it with a flagship phone for a few reasons

http://www.readwriteweb.com/archives/google_to_discontinue_nexus_one.php

Handsets
A quick look at one fairly well respected tech site sees the Nexus One ranking in at 7 out of 10 and I know its an awesome phone so all that says to me is since release its been bettered by a range of other phones - http://techie-buzz.com/mobile-news/top-android-handsets-to-purchase.html

Android Take-up
Phones with android operating systems are literally flying out the door, according to the Boss Man himself Eric Schmidt there are 160,000 being activated each day
http://gigaom.com/2010/06/23/android-daily-activations-top-160000-all-verizon-droids-will-get-froyo/ and the likes of HTC and Motorola struggling to build the phones at the same pace they're being sold http://mashable.com/2010/06/10/android-popularity/

App Market Growth
The android market itself is growing, growing, growing. Circa 15,000 new apps a month in May and June 2010 http://read.bi/9HPZ03

So, if the overall android market is growing by the day, perhaps Google have decided its better to concentrate their areas of expertise with their sites (google, youtube etc), apps (maps, goggles, shopper etc) and advertising products (search and admob) and let the specialists develop handsets which google and its multiple products can be plugged into!

So, from my outsider looking in view, I think dropping he Nexus One can be taken as a positive for google and its mobile offering.

Mobile & Social Media Futures

Check out this SlideShare Presentation: I like this guy, have read a few of his decks, mainly I'm jealous as it appears he has an exceptionally cool job.

From my perspective one of the most interesting points he makes is on slide 56, "30% of most advertising budgets will go towards mobile/social/interactive during the next 3 years"... interactive is the element that enables that sentance to be true given it can include current internet as well as the likes of radio, TV and OOH all becoming more interactive within the next 3 years.

slide 16 also interesting, looking at referral traffic for a few sites splitting between social and google and paints the picture that social drives more than google... would love to see the same for a few FMCG brands or perhaps online retailers. 6 of these are news providers so its safe to assume they're all over the social environment creating the referalls. Basically they're getting out what they put in.

Love it!

Mobile & Social Media Futures: Presentation at MedienForum NRW June 2010 (English)

View more presentations from Gerd Leonhard.