Trackbacks

It's been quite a while since I last posted: a combination of moving house, a longer commute to work and the arrival of our first child - surely the most thrilling experience in the world, spending time just staring at Isaac is more appealing than logging on to the blog.

But a colleague has asked me to check that the trackbacks on his blog are working so, with any luck, here's a trackback to Nigel Hollis' latest post, this time on buzz marketing ...

Doh! It doesn't seem to work. I'll have another go later and we'll see if we can fix it. In the meantime, here's a link anyway ... Nigel on Buzz Marketing.

update ... here's a trackback to Nigel ...

http://www.mb-blog.com/index.php/2007/02/16/better-known-or-better-liked/trackback/

Diet Coke and Mentos experiment

In response to a bit of banter on the Millward Brown blog, I was stimulated to have a go at creating my own minor replica of the Eepybird Diet Coke and Mentos experiment.

I did capture my contribution to science on film, but can only upload a picture here.

It's soooo much fun. Go on, have a go yourself ...

Too little time to write

I've been moving house recently, so I've not had time to post for a while. And I don't really have time to write properly here either.

But I did want to draw some attention to some really interesting debate that's been going on at the Millward Brown blog (remeber, that's who I work for).

Nigel started the debate with a post called 'great idea, wrong brand' about the Chevy Tahoe campaign. This stimulated some responses, not least from Max Kalehoff (of BuzzMetrics) and a further post from Nigel which he called 'a luddite at sea' in a way that quite dismisses the depth of commentary.

A couple of more recent posts also touch on word of mouth and consumer generate media:

• How to succeed in the new world of marketing: do nothing
• Do you trust me? A poll says the chances are fifty-fifty:

It's all really good discussion, and I wish I had time to provide some more insightful commentary and contribution. One thing that does strike me is the amount of heat that enters the discussion from time to time, and particularly when someone expresses an opinion that is less than entirely enthusiastic about the power of online and connected media. It's almost as though you have to be explicit that you see the "massive potential, but ..." in order to have your point of view taken seriously. To my mind, all these new media are just that, new media that should be evaluated in order to assess their potential in meeting a particular communications objective. The media itself only has a value in so far as it can help you get what you want from it; and that's the same for TV and newpapers and online.

The power of old media

There have been a couple of really interesting posts about effective campaigns of different kinds on Nigel Hollis' blog in the last week or so.

The first piece is a great example of a campaign in traditional media (largely TV) that has had a huge effect on public awareness and conversation about the dangers of meth. The campaign is for the Montana Meth Project. One of the interesting things about the campaign is the way it uses traditional TV advertising to deliver the message, but also making use of new-media to allow people to view the whole campaign online, download the ads and send them on to other people.

The campaign is a great example of picking the right media to deliver an impactful, and important message. The campaign has had a significant impact on the awareness of the dangers of meth, increased the level of disapproval of meth, and driven people to have more conversations about the risks of trying it even once. All backed by research by Millward Brown.

The success of the campaign in stimulating conversation got me to thinking about the opportunity to look to the social sector for ideas about driving and supporting consumer conversation. Sure the public sector doesn't have to develop distinct brand identities, and drugs, drink-driving, AIDS and the like give loads of scope to grab attention with pretty eye catching (if scary) ideas, but a key objective of these kinds of campaigns has always been to get people talking about the issues. I'd be fascinated to know how these campaigns have built mechanisms to support and prolong the conversations they stimulate. PR has clearly had a role, but so have community action programmes and other kinds of ground level activity.

I wonder if there are lessons to be learned for commercial word of mouth?

Beyond the fact that there are far more important messages to get people engaged with than commercial ones, the overarching thought that the success of Montana Meth leaves me with is that picking the best media (note the plural!) for the task at hand is the key thing.

In many cases, TV-style advertising still offers the best opportunity to present the idea that is at the heart of your message. There are certainly other means to get the message across, extend its reach, build its resonance and ad longevity, but TV-type copy gives the chance to present a big idea to large numbers of people. Sometimes, that's what a campaign (or brand) needs: the chance to present its big idea. Punters can then react to it, decide whether or not it's credible given the brand's delivery, what they need from the category, fits with their ethical point of view, grabs their attention and makes them love the brand.

I don't believe you can always start with a conversation, sometimes a brand needs to give people something to talk about. But yes, they should also be given the opportunity to toss the idea around, and engage with it (whether positively or negatively).

Exploring the potential of consumer conversation in planning the campaigns in the first place, now that's another story ...

Freakonomics and the working families tax credit

My regular reader will know that I'm a huge fan of Freakonomics.

So it will come as no surprise that I was interested in an article in Saturday's Guardian about how the working families tax credit has created sufficient economic incentives for 100,000 people in the UK to get into relationships. It's based on a piece of research by the Royal Holloway College. The logic is pretty simple: for women on the minimum wage, their relationship status can gain them, or cost them £50-100 a week, and that this influences their probability of getting into, or staying in, relationships. The influence is pretty small (it accounts for a 0.5% rise in the rate of relationships), but it plays a part.

It's a good example of how economic incentives shape society in quite subtle ways. I hope Levitt and Dubner spot the article.

What will succeed on the web?

There's an interesting post on Naked Conversations about the ever-increasing quantity of great web tools available these days. One of Shel Holtz's points is that a lot of people are developing really clever, useful tools that will ultimately, and through no fault of their own, fail to find a market and make their developers any money.

I have no idea how things will work out for these clever, and committed people, but a couple of thoughts come to mind:

• One of the merits of modern web (2.0) technologies is that it can be relatively quick to develop new tools and cheap bring them to market. This means that you may not need to sell very many in order to make money. Maybe not a load of money, but some.
• This is made even more powerful by the fact that these tools will probably be able to work together (and quite likely to do different jobs), there's unlikely to be beed to choose a format and then be limited to the tools you can plug into it. And so some bigger companies will probably buy some of the smaller ones and offer a range of web tools.

I'm also interested by the notion of how much time ordinary have available to work out what all these new toys do, and choose what they need. As long as the internet enables people to do the things that are really important to them faster, more easily then they will continue to make use of the good stuff available. But as soon as it starts getting more difficult they will stop.

There is a benefit in simplicity. Ease of use of is an important part of the success of much consumer technology. Personally, as soon as I spend more time trying to do things on the internet in virtual space than I spend doing the things that are important to me in the real world, I'll stop spending as much time online. I'm sure that the same kind of rule applies in the business world as well - I'll only use the stuff that actually helps me to get the job done.

So my one prediction is that the the tools that will succeed are the ones that manage to acheive a level of simplicity that allows them to capture just enough time from people to understand how useful they are. To quote Einstein, "everything should be made as simple as possible, but not simpler."

MS Ipod Parody - Google Video

There's been a lot in the news of late about Apple and Microsoft, what with the news that Apple about now making it possible to load Windows XP on their hardware, via something called Boot Camp.

And everyone seems to think take it as read that Apple and Microsoft really are like chalk and cheese. But while their methods may be different, surely they both just have a real passion for connecting people with the possibilities that their technology opens up. We shouldn't knock either of them for that.

Just see how positive Robert Scoble is about Apple's ability to respond to the blogging community.

So I thought I'd track down a viral clip that I've been hearing about for ages - the spoofed MS version of the iPod packaging. Fantastic! A bt of light weekend relief.

Blog (n)Etiquette

I was chatting to colleague earlier this week about the etiquette of blogging. He's even newer to this game than I am, and wasn't sure of the accepted behaviour. So I tried to offer some advice, but got to thinking that I really just make it up as I go along too. And then I thought I'd have a browse on the old interweb for some (n)etiquette. But how hard was it to find anything coherent??!!

So far, nothing new: "Shock! Man struggles to find exactly what he needs on the internet."

But then I started reading the posts, and the real reason that there's no easy-to-find code of how to behave in blogland started to become apparent. It's because different types of blog demand different rules - it's almost like the real world! What might be apropriate on one blog is completely out of order in another community. It's a skill on the part of the reader to pick up the tone of what is and isn't appropriate, and to read, comment and reply accordlingly.

Like any other area where freedom of speech is sacred, we have to work out when to keep our mouths shut.

So, my favourite blog etiquette posts ...

• I did quite like cafemama. Ordinarily, it's not my kind of place, but the post started out with exactly the same premise as mine, so I was drawn to it.
• rocksinmydryer is another "mum's" (or "mom's") blog with a post on netiquette, with loads of readers' comments. But both of these are very much personal life-style sites.
• So then I came to talkturkey, which pointed me to my favourite post on the subject of blogging etiquette. Why do I like it? Because it's written with a real sense of personal style - you might not like it, but at least it stimulates a reaction.

And I guess I should probably sign off with a couple of my tips for righteous behaviour in the blogsphere. Two tips:

• Reference your sources - surely the real joy of the internet as a social medium is that it's all joined up. It can be irritating as hell, but following a stream of conciousness through several links and not being able to remember who you got to where you arrived is the road to serendipity.
• And express your personality: have an opinion; have something to say; write as if you mean it.