Greg Verdino

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Coopetwition gives two soda giants bubbly feelings

The story: a member of the Twitterverse suggests that @pepsi and @cocacola put age-old competitive rivalries aside and become Twitter friends.  The brands agree and shake virtual hands.

Sure the person who made the suggestion isn't quite an everyday Joe -- he is the founder of the Aussie arm of Razorfish and has done work with PepsiCo -- and the gesture between the two soft drink giants is as silly as it is symbolic.  But still, it makes for a fun story.

Can Twitter teach the world to sing in perfect harmony?

 

(via Darryl Ohrt; image reposted from my Posterous.)

5 ways every marketer can have a "dancing man moment"

Last night, social media serendipity led me to a video of a man dancing at an outdoor music festival. The dancing man himself isn't anything special -- a clumsy show of flailing arms and legs that wouldn't get him through the first round of auditions on So You Think You Can Dance. 

What happens next is pretty special (or at least interesting.)

When the man starts dancing, he is the only member of the crowd moving.  In fact, it almost seems as if the rest of the audience is blissfully unaware that they're at a music festival at all.  But within seconds he's joined by one, then two, then three other dancers.  Within three minutes, hundreds of people are dancing.

And like countless other seemingly insignificant moments, all of it was caught on video and uploaded to the web.  Within a month of being shared on YouTube, more than one million people have viewed the clip, more than five thousand have rated it, and more than three thousand have left comments. And it turns out that these few minutes in time were captured and uploaded by several different amateur shooters who were there to witness it, so the cumulative numbers are higher still.

That's a pretty impressive ripple effect (or maybe it's a butterfly effect) for something that began with literally just one person willing to do something nobody around him was doing.

Now is probably as good a time as any to watch the video, if you haven't seen it:

[Feed and email readers, click through to view.]

OK, so what does this have to do with marketing?

Certainly the dancing man provides a clear (if trivial) example of how the actions of a sole individual can provide the catalyst that not only directly influences the behavior of the people around them, but also have the potential to scale up to have something approximating mass reach.  Rather than reaching out to millions in the hopes of finding and connecting with "the one" (who responds, who buys, who changes their behavior), why not start with the one who can influence hundreds and ultimately reach millions?

Perhaps the dancing man also offers a lesson about risk and reward -- as a marketer, are you willing to try something (and potentially look foolish) on the off chance that it will deliver an exponential result?  Or will you sit on the sidelines for fear of failure?

But mostly, it leads me to ponder how marketers can have their own Dancing Man Moments.  Off the top of my head, here are five ways:

1. Be the Dancing Man: do something remarkable to spark a movement; star in the story yourself
2. Bear Witness to the Dancing Man: document his actions; capture the moment; be the storyteller
3. Put the Dancing Man on a Bigger Stage: celebrate him; tell everyone you know (your customers, audience, fans, friends); provide access to your larger network of distribution (after all, chances are your brand is bigger than his...)
4. Join the Dancing Man: tap into the momentum of the movement; follow the dancing man's lead but play your own unique part in how the story unfolds
5. Be the Song to His Dance: go beyond just joining in; contribute something unique and different, yet complementary; in fact, why not inspire him to dance in the first place

But enough of my yammering. I'd love to hear from you -- what do you think marketers can do to have their own Dancing Man Moments?

Bits, bytes, posterous, punk

A recent post by Steve Rubel inspired me to dust off my "lightly used" (a euphemism for "never used") Posterous account and launch a new blog-like-object called Verdino Bytes.  With an easy-to-use bookmarklet for clipping content straight from the web and an even-easier-to-use post via email function, Posterous is ideal for creating and sharing content that falls somewhere between my fully formed blog posts and my malformed tweets.

It's a perfect tool for capturing and sharing everything from cool photos, interesting videos, random thoughts, stray ideas and crap I find all around the interwebz.  And with my regular blog output dialed down while I peck my way through the manuscript for my book, it's a simple low-impact way to pump out web content (ahem, make that micro-content) without giving my McGraw-Hill editor reason to believe I've taken her money and run.

The blog you're reading now is and will remain my primary online hub, but if you're looking for more regular updates over the next few months -- and are OK with the eclectic nature of what I'm posting over there -- you may want to subscribe to Verdino Bytes.  For the most part, there will be no duplication between what I post here and what I post there so it's more great Verdino for the same low price (e.g., free unless you're reading this on your Kindle, you big nerd.)

Even if Verdino Bytes doesn't seem like your cup of tea, you still might dig this video I posted there tonight.  Produced by an Australian reputation management firm (meaning a reputation management firm based in AU, not a firm dedicated to managing Australian reputations), it draws parallels between the punk rock movement in the 1970s and the social media revolution going on right now.  Good stuff.

[Feed and email readers click to the blog to watch the video.]

As always, I'd love to hear your thoughts.

Tomorrow is gone too: social media RIP

Friend, look-alike, PR man and Now Is Gone author Geoff Livingston is stirring the pot today, with a pretty provocative proclamation -- "social media is dead."

Tucked away in a post about why the next Blog Potomac conference -- slated for October 2009 and featuring fellow crayonista Jane Quigley -- will be the last, lies Geoff's eulogy for a form of media and marketing that many still consider the latest shiny object in the marketing practitioner's box of baubles.

The technology adoption cycle has been maturing for social media (and social media, web 2.0 whatever you want to call it is definitely inspired by technology) for some time. Widespread corporate adoption is happening as we speak, albeit with many stumbles. Based on conversations I’m having, even the most conservative organizations are adapting now.

The time when social media as a special or unique or “shiny and new” type of communication is rapidly ending. Does that mean it’s going away? Hardly.

But from an innovators standpoint, as someone who lives on the edge, who wants to be where new frontiers are being created, we’re at the end. For me, social media is dead… That means it’s future forward.

While my experience with conservative organizations leads me to suspect that Geoff thinks we're further along the Technology Adoption Lifecycle (or more precisely the "marketing adoption cycle" - I don't think we can debate that the technology itself is mainstream) than we really are, I'm not sure that Geoff is wrong.  At least not entirely.

If we're talking about social media as a category, as something special, unique or new, then it probably is (or should be, anyway) dead or dying.  The notion of social media as a silo and as something that warrants specialized expertise is nothing more than a point of inflection between a new media landscape that is entirely, seamlessly social and an old media landscape that was always social anyway (even if we didn't know it.)

Then again, I'm not sure the death of social media matters a whole lot to anyone but the "next new thing" innovation junkies.  Is Geoff arguing in favor of shiny object syndrome at a time when, frankly, most marketers are still not making the best use of the last big thing?  Hey, I'm an innovator too (or at least, I like to think I am) and I'm also keen to identify and understand whatever lies around the next bend, but I also know that tomorrow's toys don't amount to a hill of beans to an in-the-trenches marketer who is (let's be honest) at best dabbling in social and still thinks they've had a coup if they convince their agency creative director to display the corporate URL at the end of the new 30-second spot.

So on the one hand we have a small band of serial innovators already seeking out greener pastures.  On the other, we have the rest of the herd who are just beginning to suspect that the ground might be shifting right beneath their hooves.

So whether social media is dead or not, it surely seems to be trapped in limbo.

What are your thoughts?  Is social media dead or is Livingston burying it alive?

A buffet of delicious micro-media snacks

I've always been an information junkie.  I suppose you need to be if you want to stay one step ahead of the changes that happen just about daily in marketing nowadays.

Now that I'm working on my book though, I find that I need to be a lot more disciplined about actually keeping track of all the relevant news stories, interesting factoids, ideas, tips, tricks, case studies and concepts that might (just might) serve as useful background for a chapter, paragraph or sentence I might tap out months from now. 

Sometimes the tidbits come from traditional media, in which case they find themselves ripped from the sources and scattered about whatever surface I happen to be working on (see Exhibit A, above.)

But for the most part, I find my inspiration on the web. Shocking, I know.

If you're interested in getting a peek behind the curtains -- and into the cluttered anteroom of my mind -- as I tap my way through the manuscript for microMARKETING, you can keep tabs on my Delicious tags.

I've been tagging interesting articles and other people's blog posts "micromarketing" since April, and will continue doing so as I find things that may come in handy throughout the writing process. You don't get to shuffle through my stack of loose magazine clippings unless you stop by for a visit (or live here), but my Delicious bookmarks are the next best thing.

Don't get lost and try to leave things more or less the way you found them. :-)  And, if you're so inclined, feel free to suggest pieces you've read elsewhere that you think I might find interesting.

If Twitter were a state, it would be Arkansas

No offense to Arkansas.

I've only been there once, for just one day, so I could be way off base here.  But bear with me for a few moments. 

I was traveling with Jaffe and we flew into a quirky, sleepy, little airport early in the morning.  As we hit the road by car, headed to our meeting, Arkansas seemed to comprise little more than open fields dotted with a handful of cows hanging around doing a whole lot of nothing, and the occasional seemingly-deserted house. Now, anyone with even a passing knowledge of business and geography knows that Arkansas is also home to at least one vibrant and vital hub of activity, a place that is chock-a-block with conversation and commerce, a place that is a can't-survive-without destination for thousands of business people and millions upon millions of consumers. But neither hustle nor bustle were among my first impressions of the state.

Jaffe and I spent most of the day sitting in a coffee shop, waiting for something to happen.  When our meeting finally happened, it was a bit of a let-down, fraught with mixed messages and crossed signals, and then aircraft technical issues grounded us in Arkansas overnight. 

On the flipside, Jaffe did manage to convert a stranger into a fan, or more precisely a follower who hung around with us both at the airport and later that evening in the hotel bar, where rather than engage in any kind of meaningful conversation we half-watched American Idol while blurting out a real-time stream of running commentary.

In one random moment of surprise and delight (and social media serendipity), we bumped into blogger, Twitteratum and IBMer Doug Meacham, who just so happened to be in the same place at the same time.  It was a nice few moments of interaction with a social media friend that I only rarely see in person.

If you happen to live in Arkansas, you might protest that -- on the basis of a one day visit -- I've gotten it all wrong.  I missed the point, have no idea what I'm talking about, and that only a true resident can know the state the way the state was meant to be known.  You'd probably be right but it doesn't change the fact that my experience of Arkansas was my experience of Arkansas.

Back in New York when anyone asked, "So what was Arkansas like?" I might recount a rendition of the story above.  Or I might just say something like, "Well, are you on Twitter yet?  It was kinda like that."

For new or infrequent readers who don't know that my tongue is generally planted at least somewhat firmly in-cheek, I should also point out that the mockingbird is Arkansas's state bird.  Which, by way of the clunkiest segue possible, brings me from the great state of Arkansas to the great state of the Twittersphere...

Today, HubSpot released its second State of the Twittersphere report.  Some of the key findings are (un)surprisingly similar to other recent data from ratings giant Nielsen -- that while the service's top-line rate of growth has been through the roof, more than half of all Twitter accounts show little to no sign of activity.  No Tweets. No followers. No friends. 

A deeper dive into the data seems to suggest that the typical Twitter user looks more like my cousin Joe (no relation to Jaffe) and less like me. 

Joe's profile shows no bio, no location, the generic o_O avatar and a single exploratory tweet from more than a month ago.  He has fewer than 10 followers and is following just 23 other accounts.  Look at the accounts he follows and you'll find mostly celebrities and mainstream media outlets, with a few social media micro-celebs and a spammer thrown in for good measure.

At best, you might argue that Joe sees Twitter as a passive experience -- he "tunes in" a handful of brand name channels and watches the content they post.  You might call this the Oprah Effect and this patttern seems to back-up a recent POV from Brian Solis that, for the majority of users, Twitter is a broadcast platform rather than the conversation we social media insiders make it out to be.  And let's face facts people -- with more than a million followers but only a handful of celeb follows and no @ replies since April (none to regular people), Oprah hasn't exactly "joined the conversation."  To the contrary, she has launched yet another broadcast program - although with just 50 or so tweets since joining the service almost two months ago, it isn't a broadcast worth tuning into.  (Love him, hate him or write him off as having hit his peak with That 70's Show, at least Ashton Kutcher seems to get it closer to right - but I digress...)

There's a more likely scenario though, isn't there? 

You can see it in my cousin's profile, but you might infer it from the HubSpot and Nielsen data as well.  That Joe simply visited once, just for one day, and hasn't been back since. (Holy crap, did Verdino just tie together the loose ends of this rambling post?)

This is more an observation than a judgment, since after all, I'm not a big proponent of the bigger-is-better thinking that gets so many marketers hot and bothered.  Maybe my cousin Joe is a living embodiment of the state of Twitter (an argument that would please the naysayers and skeptics) or maybe the true state of Twitter is best understood by taking a long, hard look at the most active users that live in its epicenter -- and we don't care how it looks to outsiders who don't get it (an argument that plays right into the hands of the social media "experts" but is perhaps closer to right.)

In other words - maybe microblogging is meant to be, erm, micro after all. 

And in the end, the value doesn't come from the millions and millions of strangers who may or may not actually be there, but from the dozens or hundreds or thousands of friends that we choose to interact with every day.

Thoughts?

NOTICE (6/16: 9pm EST)  For some reason, comments aren't displaying for this post anymore.  It seems like Typepad is still logging them and hopefully they can help me figure out how to fix the problem. Don't let that keep you from adding your own thoughts though, and try checking back soon to read the thread.

Three B2B marketers dish out social media tips & tricks

Tomorrow morning, I'm heading to Boston, where I'm slated to moderate a panel at the MarketingProfs Business-to-Business Forum.  This post isn't really about my speaking engagement per se, although I should mention that there's still time to register if you're interested in attending a great, no-nonsense event.

What this post really is about though is no-nonsense.  My session asks the question, "What will social media do for my business?" and we'll offer answers not from the usual gaggle of consultants, agency social media gurus or platform vendors (you've been to that panel a few too many times, I'd suspect) but directly from three client-side marketers who are deploying social programs for their companies today.

Even if you can't be at the event, I thought you might be interested in some of the tips and advice the panelists will share.  Take a gander at a hand-out we prepared, bringing together 15 practical points from three seasoned marketers -- Aneta Hall at Pitney Bowes, Donna Tocci at Ingersoll Rand and Monique Trulson at Hello Direct.

View more presentations from Greg Verdino.

[Feed and email readers may need to click through to see the embedded slide show.  Or you can view it directly on Slideshare.]

Now, I suspect some of you have great tips to share as well.  So chime in (especially if you're a client-side marketer) -- what does social media do for your business?

Book 'em Verdino: announcing microMARKETING

I'm excited to announce that I've inked a deal with McGraw-Hill for the publication of my first business book, microMARKETING: A Breakthrough Approach to Building Brands by Thinking and Acting Small.

If the title alone isn't enough to clue you in, I'd like to give you an idea of the ground I'll cover in the book.  Here's a bit of how I described the book in the proposal itself:

A media revolution is underway, fueled by a micro-content phenomenon that is shifting the balance of power from mass communications to masses of communicators.  This shift plays out daily on blogs, Twitter, Facebook, Ustream and other social sites.  It’s in the notion that an otherwise normal individual can use social media and low-end technology to become a micro-celebrity with a significant following.  It’s in the viral effect that takes hold when even one online influencer (in essence a one-person media outlet) sparks a conversation that makes or breaks a brand.  It’s in the shift in behavior that is turning the smart phone into the “first screen” for Gen Y and many increasingly-mobile Gen Xers.  It’s in the shift from watching 60 minute television shows interrupted by 30-second advertisements, to watching 30-second pieces of online video content with no advertisements at all.  It’s even in the changing of our expectations of product design and retail sales, giving rise to dozens of successful small businesses and individuals (think Threadless, think Etsy, think Mimobot, think Lemonade) that can create and sell enough high quality, unique or custom merchandise at a premium to shoppers for whom choice and individuality matter more than convenience and price. 

These are exciting times, but they can also be scary times for marketers who have been trained to think that bigger is better, and for whom the excesses and successes of the past 50 or so years – big budgets for major media ad campaigns designed to sell mountains of product through big-box retailers – seem to be the only way to build a big brand.  For better or worse, the new reality is that the old way doesn’t work so well anymore. Simply put, micro-content and macro-marketing don’t mix – and trying to maintain the status quo while consumer behaviors and expectations change amounts to little more than a recipe for failure.

Enter micromarketing – a new approach to building brands, marketing products and services, and growing meaningful long-term customer (and corporate) value.  Micromarketing emphasizes relationships over reach, interactions over interruption, and the network effect over the broadcast network.  It is built upon the premise that the “next big thing” is really lots and lots of small things, and that to survive and thrive, even the biggest marketers must think and act small (make that “micro”), too. 

microMARKETING is not a "Twitter book."  Puh-leeze... In signature Verdino-style, I will aim to help marketers understand the larger trends that are driving the popularity of tools like Twitter and what the real world implications are for businesses (even if Twitter itself -- or Facebook or YouTube, for that matter -- goes away), but my focus will be aimed squarely at the big picture.  I also don't plan to trot out the same ol' tired social media case studies.  In fact, one key piece of my approach is to help large companies understand how to thrive in the era of micro-content and micro-culture by taking lessons from the people and organizations that are involved in the revolution at the grassroots level.  In other words, I'll be looking at what the biggest of big corporations should learn from "whatever experts." 

Again, from the proposal:

Over the past several years, social media has evolved from a trend to watch to an irrefutable fact of life for marketers of all sizes.  Now – before most companies have even gotten social media right – the mainstreaming of micro-content services, the ubiquity of powerful low-cost handheld technology (from Internet-ready phones to consumer-grade HD cameras) and the rise of DIY culture promise to change the rules of consumer engagement yet again.  It is important to understand how these changes impact our ability to build brands, manage customer relationships and drive sales today, and this will only become more important over the coming years as more and more consumers flock to the technologies that are powering the shift.

On the flipside, it is also important that marketers not get swept up in the hype surrounding a single tool or tactic, losing sight of the bigger implications for their businesses.  As has happened with core social media tools like blogging, podcasting and social networking (and short-lived fads like Second Life), marketers now run the risk of not seeing the forest for the trees – of jumping on the “Twitter bandwagon” with short-lived, ill-advised tactics that do little to impact their businesses.   

On the one hand, microMARKETING educates decision makers about larger trends and what they mean for companies who are looking to more effectively engage consumers through new digital channels.  On the other hand, it delivers tangible and practical case studies, stories, tips and tricks from familiar competitors (other large corporations) and unlikely sources of inspiration (micro-businesses and individual creators.)

microMARKETING is slated for a May/June 2010 release.  I need to hand in the final manuscript by mid-October.  Needless to say, I've got my work cut out for me over the next few months.

That may mean less blogging for the next few months, although I'll still try to post here at least once/week.  And you should stay tuned for periodic updates on the book, my progress and the process.  Hell, I may even ask you for some input along the way.

Finally, I'd like to thank the good folks at McGraw-Hill -- especially Donya Dickerson -- and my agent Ethan Friedman at LevelFive Media.

Good times, ahead...

Stop me if you think you've heard this one before...

This video, portraying a funny-because-it's-true reality about how clients negotiate with their agencies, made the rounds on Twitter yesterday.  On the other hand, I'd imagine there's ample fodder for a video response that dramatizes all of the unsavory ways agencies 'manage' their clients.

Well... no matter which side of the table you sit on, the video is worth a few minutes of your time if you haven't seen it yet.  Enjoy!  And don't forget to chime in with your witty commentary.

[Feed and email readers: visit the blog to watch the video.]

Storytelling at the brink of the future?

Although the odds are pretty good you'll never read a fiction review on this blog, I can't help but tell y'all about J.C. Hutchins' forthcoming novel Personal Effects: Dark Art.  It's a supernatural thriller that pits an art therapist at a psychiatric institute against a blind serial killer/patient -- it may or may not be your cup of tea, and the actual content of the book isn't why I'm telling you about it.

The thing that probably will interest you is the way (ways plural, really) J.C. has taken what he has learned through years of social media self-publishing to create a work that goes well beyond the printed page, encompassing digital, mobile and the physical world to create a fully participatory multimedia narrative.  In many ways, Personal Effects is a novel custom-designed for digital natives (although J.C. and his publisher may not think of it that way) and it just might offer a glimpse at the future of storytelling.

 And the future of storytelling should matter to you no matter what products your company produces or promotes because, as marketers, our success often rides on both our ability to tell compelling stories and our customers' willingness and ability to spread their own stories about their experiences with our brands.

 Of course, everything begins with the book itself.  Let's assume it's good -- I haven't read it yet, but look forward to digging into the advance copy I received over the weekend (thanks J.C.)

But Personal Effects really gets interesting when it gets innovative.  If you aren't familiar with J.C. Hutchins (frankly, I only knew of him through some mutual contacts and from hearing his name bandied about in social media circles), he is a good example of what I have called a "whatever expert" -- someone who is good at what he does and has found a way to succeed at it through smart, effective use of social media.  Although Personal Effects is his first published novel, he has been writing for years, releasing his work as free audiobooks and using the web and social media to build a loyal audience.

J.C. isn't a marketer by training or trade, but the digital and multimedia components of his project offer a practical blueprint for any marketer looking to transform their brand storytelling into an active, participatory experience that is fueled by community and optimized for customer-to-consumer word of mouth.  Readers can enter the world of Personal Effects in a variety of ways:

• Technology-Fueled Calls-to-Action: Clues peppered throughout the novel and in the killer's personal effects packaged with the novel (e.g., a drivers license, photos, hospital paperwork) drive readers to companion websites, forums, onto email lists, into mobile phone voicemail systems and opt-in text messaging programs and more where they can find and explore additional layers of narrative.

• A Distributed, Online Experience: Readers can get inside the heads of key characters through their social network profiles, personal blogs and Twitter streams.

• Original, Distributable Content: Tapping into his heritage as a popular and well-established podcaster, J.C. has produced an exclusive audio-only novella prequel, as well as a series of YouTube-friendly video promos featuring well known horror personalities.

• Seamless Integration with Relevant Third Party Sites: One of the characters (yes, a fictional character from the book) has written columns for Suicide Girls, a site (some content NSFW) whose readership seems to be well aligned with J.C.'s audience, and there is a planned deep integration that brings Suicide Girl models into the novel's fictional world and provides readers with an additional web-only subplot.

• A Fan Community: Readers can 'commit themselves to the Brink' (aka Brinkvale Psychiatric, where the novel takes place), submit their own artwork for display in the community gallery (a logical tie-in with the fact that the book's protagonist is an art therapist at the Brink) and receive personalized intake paperwork.  In other words, readers don't just consume the story; they become part of it.

• Creative, Innovative Influencer Outreach: This is how I became aware of the book in the first place and may bear some of the most relevant lessons for social media marketers.  Over the weekend, the mailman delivered an unexpected package, a good-sized box that contained materials that immediately piqued my interest, earned my attention and (true to the spirit of Personal Effects) drew me directly into the fictional world of Brinkvale Psychiatric.  Containing not only a reviewer's copy of the book and the obligatory media kit, the package was filled with my personal effects from my own stay at the Brink.  Everything was hyper-personalized and it was impossible not to dive in (and just as impossible not to tell others about it -- and last time I checked, that's what influencer outreach is all about.)  Here are a couple of photos and you can check out more on Flickr -- but be warned, you're bound to dismiss your run-of-the-mill blogger outreach emails as downright asinine...

 

 

So what's the bottom line?  J.C. is tapping into the power of digital and the potential of social to turn the lay-back (and some might say dying) act of reading a novel into a fully immersive lean-forward experience.  It's equal parts fiction and alternate reality game, powered by a healthy dose of practical Web 2.0 know-how. Followers of pop culture may draw parallels between Personal Effects and the similarly rich multimedia storytelling approaches used to fuel films like Blair Witch Project, television shows like Lost, video games like Halo 2 and even a recent album release by Nine Inch Nails.  Brands have occassionally tapped into this form of multimedia storytelling to do cool and interesting things -- see Audi's Art of the Heist, for example.  But to my knowledge, this is the first time an author has undertaken something so ambitious in association with a novel -- and it just might get digital natives to pick up a plain old printed book. 

Am I gushing?  Sorry.  It's pretty cool and makes me want to curl up with Personal Effects, my laptop and my iPhone right now.

Barring that though (damn you, workload, damn you), I'd love to hear from you.  Which of J.C.'s approaches do you think you can apply to get your customers involved in your brand's story?