I use Comcast for my home internet service. The connection is fast and pretty reliable, but dealing with their customer service department is like dealing with wooden puppets who can’t answer any question that doesn’t come off a cue card. I’m not the first person to have a complaint like this and candidly if you spend anytime searching the web you’ll find people with issues that range from annoying to shockingly bad.

They’ve managed to inspire a multitude of hate websites from ihatecomcast.com to comcastsucks.org. If you search Comcast on Google there is a video result showing a Comcast technician sleeping on a customer’s couch. I frequently talk about how a brand’s perception is now being defined not only by their own messaging, but by the content consumers are creating and permeating search, media sharing sites, and viral jokes. Comcast is case study example number one.

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LinkedIn announced today that it’s adding the ability to add custom applications to your profile page. It’s based on the OpenSocial application development platform.

OpenSocial didn’t take off nearly as fast as I thought it would. I had always assumed that when MySpace enabled it that adoption would pick-up rapidly. LinkedIn has now finally enabled it and I believe future tech like Google Friend Connect (which also uses OpenSocial) will really push this application platform over the top.

I installed two applications immediately. An application to quickly and easily port this blog to my profile as well an application that scans twitter with references to my company. The two apps are called Wordpress and Company Buzz respectively.

The installation was easy in terms of the number of clicks, but there were some bugs. LinkedIn didn’t acknowledge that the application was complete and the apps were only working intermittently when I viewed my profile. On the basis that I got the email they were launching this at 12.21 AM and blogged about it at 1.35 AM I’m going to cut them some slack. Hopefully it will work a bit better by the time you check it out.

If you haven’t got a LinkedIn profile yet your missing out. Social networking in the business space is equally as interesting as Facebook or MySpace. It’s just harder to pick up a date on LinkedIn…

Everyone knows that we’re very passionate about Facebook. We’ve been actively building Facebook applications since they first launched and consider them to be one of the fundamental differentiators that helped propel Facebook to such lofty heights.

Facebook embraced what I believe builds the most successful new model businesses successes on the web. They created an open platform and let user innovation drive the direction of their business. Unfortunately, like most open platforms, it got out of control. People abused their rights in an effort to push their application to the top. The constant stream of invitations to join applications became one of the number one gripes of Facebook users as they felt they were being aggressively “spammed” (even if it was by their friends).

Facebook has been re-evaluating it’s infrastructure quite a bit these days. A new Facebook layout, for better or worse, has been released. Additionally they have been making some heavy changes to how applications were handled within the system beyond the presentation layer.

The obvious change that you would have noticed includes shifting all of your applications mini-views to a tab on your profile called “Boxes”. Really? They couldn’t name it “applications” or “apps” so it was even mildly intuitive. It’s bad enough that they’re now treating the application concept they popularized as the ugly step-child, but this is just adding insult to injury. I wish they made the tab name “don’t click here” - it would probably get more people to check it out.

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(at least in my books for his outstanding use of digital marketing…)

The Obama's latest campaign initiative: an iPhone Application

I’m consistently impressed with the Obama campaign’s innovative marketing campaigns. They’re not doing anything particularly revoutionary by the marketing world’s standards, but in the world of politics they might have well been transported here from the ninth dimension.

Let’s compare the campaigns.

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When I look at some of the most successful marketing campaigns I have been fortunate enough to be involved with I have started to realize that, in most cases, they fit into two categories. One category is projects that have a very high pass-along factor and the second is projects that have a very high pass-along factor and are very press friendly. These press friendly ideas, like Trevor The Mentos Intern or Guinness Hands for example, received exponentially more traffic because of their original content that truly was unlike almost anything on the web at the time of their release. When bloggers received links from us or tips from friends it was easy for them to find a reason to write about it in the hopes that they’d publish before anyone else or felt a sincere need to tell their friends.

These ideas aren’t always the most sane (yet again, reference Trevor The Mentos Intern) and in some cases they’re not particularly politically correct. The fashion company Diesel seems to have a really good grasp of how to make these press friendly viral campaigns. They did it very successfully last year when they had two models “kidnap” a sales person and the company’s primary website while interacting with visitors via a live web cam.

VIDEO AFTER THE JUMP.

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PART V OF THE “TREND WATCHING TO GAIN A COMPETITIVE EDGE IN MARKETING” SERIES:

Let's Hug!

A survey was done at the end of last year that asked people  What their most important source of information was. 80% responded the Internet followed by TV, Radio, and Newspaper at 68%, 63%, and 63% respectively. Simultaneously 73% of people responded personal source as their most important method. When the two highest categories Internet and Personal Source can be so close coordinated in a social network it paves the way for potentially the most important way to communicate with consumers. - USC Annenberg School: Digital Future Report 2007

We can target Age, Connection Type, Day Part, Education Level, Ethnicity, Gender, Geographical, Interest Groups, Marital Status, Parents, Religion, Sexual Orientation, Smoker/Drinker, Enthusiast Targeting.  Unfortunately we’re still just pushing more target ads, when we should be targeting communities and using this knowledge to engage them in a longer conversation.

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PART IV OF THE “TREND WATCHING TO GAIN A COMPETITIVE EDGE IN MARKETING” SERIES:

Use with skill and caution....

In my previous post I talked about the concept of micro-celebrities. Where are some of these micro-celebrities and how do we use them help us launch products.

Look to Personal Blogging, Fanfiction Writing, Podcasting, Video Blogging, and even the profile pages of your friends on social networking sites. (The other option is to create your own micro-celebrities like Trevor the Mentos Intern, but we’ll get to that in a second.)

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PART III OF THE “TREND WATCHING TO GAIN A COMPETITIVE EDGE IN MARKETING” SERIES:

Everyone talk’s about using “key influencers”. We hear these terms used in pitches for new campaigns all the time.

 It’s easy to think of businesses, celebrities, or high profile websites as “key influencers” or places “key influencers” frequent respectively, but today’s new media key influencers are far more powerful then any of their predecessors.

They have a platform – a large platform. They can create content hourly or daily if they like. They’re not like writers who created editorial content for magazines – they’re not beholden to anyone. They blog, vlog, twitter, or live broadcast their thoughts in the form of random thoughts, daily news, or even skits.

 More importantly, due to the strength of their personalities and frequently lack of corporate association, these new media key influencers are able to build long-term trusting relationships with consumers.

We need to leverage these key influencers with product placement or subtle endorsements. Notice I said subtle. These are inexpensive ways to get your brand out there. 

SMOSH is a great example. As of April 2008, they have over 337,000 subscribers on YouTube, making them the most subscribed “producers” on YouTube. Most of their videos have over 2 to 3 million views. Smosh’s most famous video, a tribue to the Pokemon Theme had more then 24,000,000 views on YouTube.

The reality is very few media buying companies are recommending these solutions to their clients. I haven’t decided if I think it’s because it’s their not social media friendly or if they’re just lazy and don’t want to look out of their typical comfort zone. Whatever the reason - there’s an opportunity for marketers here.

The following post is Part 1 in a multi series post that will occur each day for the next two weeks. It’s based on my favorite speaking engagement of this year that I presented to the marketing leadership team at GE. If you haven’t subscribed yet this might be a good reason.

I'll be ranting about the following for the next two weeks....

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The second Microsoft “Bill and Jerry” ad is online today. It already had over 300,000 views by the time I was able to make some time to look at it.

Several people have been quick to point out it feels almost like an episode of the American comedy “Arrested Development”. It’s quirkiness is somewhat endearing and I think the fact that they’re willing to poke fun at themselves for being disconnected and not relevant was a smart move.

They also revealed the new “Perpetually Connecting” tag line. Anything that supports the perpetual networking of not only technology but the social web is something I think is highly relevant in today’s world.  Read More »