If marketing is to become a more integrated part of the product experience/context, baked in and/or eventually become more important than the product:

“Marketing becomes the value people want to connect with, the product is merely an invitation into this relationship”. – link

Then it means a different set of demands needs to be put on marketing.

Digital services can’t be measured by downloads, clicks, uses or other advertising-type measures. Marketing integrated with the product needs to be measured by its ability to create value in and business from the relationship with the participant. Marketing needs to be measured by its own business model.

When the marketing becomes the value provider in the company/participant relationship, it needs to define its idea, value proposition, revenue stream and how this is going to measured. Not merely how much attention and use it has generated from being available.

In short, marketing initiatives need more business model thinking integrated into their design process. (And of course this is not exclusive – forcing the BM-ideas to collaborate or grow from narrative ideas creates an environment set to earn from the combination of both worlds).

We might be cautious of forcing new behavior on our participants, because of a reasonable fear that it will be difficult for people to adapt. So we try to find and design solutions inside people’s existing behavioral pattern. But this limits our ability to create better value in our relationships with our participants.

Behavioral psychologist Donald Norman says people adapt to technology; we have always made things that people had to learn – like a doorknob – which attributes new behaviors in their lives. It may have made their lives more practical or better – but they had to learn it.

In the context of company/customer relationships and through the lens of services, Tim Brown, of IDEO, ads to this train of thought:

“Any Service organization has got to get over the idea that a great service is something where the consumer doesn’t have to do anything. That’s a really bad service. A great service is where the consumer actually participates, and where they get drawn in, and where they become part of it.”

People following this blog might have already seen some of my frustration with today’s standards for graphical user interfaces, which I find are almost exclusively based on anything else than the human aspect:

It seems we are at the end of a period where interactive design was mere decoration. Where algorithmic logic and robotic rationality shaped the reasoning behind the interfaces trying to engage people in services, content and marketing. – http://www.180360720.no/index.php/archive/post-digital-design/

As the quote suggests we might be at the end of this era, forced through by a greater understanding for the human aspect as technology is immersing into our everyday life. And as a consequence of new platforms inviting us to interact without mechanical augmentations, such as the mouse and keyboard.

But this should not apply to only stuff happening on a two-dimensional screen, where the ability to involve and engage are limited, we should start thinking how to take our services outside the screen, and into the physical environment.

If one looks at a video game console like Wii, or even the physical augmentation of games like Buzz or Guitar Hero, we can ask ourselves, why aren’t banks, retailers or FMCG doing this? What is the barrier to thinking about physical objects when thinking of digital services?

There are already a range of brilliant and inspiring examples:
(Some of these are just concepts or prototypes)

The Copenhagen Wheel

Phillips – Direct Life

Charmr

The BP Photobooth

Sniff

Delivering immediate effect might not be the best business model for designing long-term valuable marketing initiatives.

Advertising is known for getting peoples attention and affecting people’s anticipation of an experience or product. Advertising is media related, the effect is purchasable through unlimited scope.

Advertising is direct, unwanted, often irritating and too often exhaustingly repetitive. It’s short compact stories or direct messages, highlighting exaggerations and often packaged in a clichéd pun. It’s responsive, and provides hot bursts of immediate effect, which cools down quickly.

Brilliant storytellers used to change millions of minds for decades, today they gather millions of views on youtube.

In my mind, advertising is faced with a challenge; it’s own business model, label or sales pitch: We move people and products – fast.

There is a need for long term marketing initiatives; digital concepts and ideas need to carry the longevity of product relationships. Which also implies a different way of measuring value. (What are the metrics identifying the value of a relationship? Are they the same as used for our ability to traffic people back and forth from, and around in, cyberspace?)

The question is, if the advertising industry is in a place clients come with the preconception to create long term marketing initiatives, or if one needs to alter the idea of what the advertising industry does if we are to acquire and lead these projects.

As a friend of mine, David Reid, told me yesterday, referencing a quote by Martin Sorrell: “We are not in the advertising business, we are in the marketing communications business”.

I would say Zeus Jones and Berg London certainly aren’t advertising agencies, but they are doing some of the most interesting stuff out there in this regards. On the other hand you’ve got Razorfish, CP+B and AKQA proving me wrong.

Any ideas?

Adding digital components to increase the engagement in and value created from a TV event, means thinking outside the obvious Facebook chat integration, the PC, online, and even the TV event itself.

In a recent study by Kaiser on the trends of American youth, shared by JWT on their Intelligence blog, there are numbers stating the increase in multitasking while enjoying other mediums (TV, Radio, Computer). No surprise, but the interesting point is what kind of medium they are multitasking with.

Multitasking is the wrong word here, as the brain can’t possibly do two things at the same time. The correct description would be “switching focus”. As stated by the America Scientist: “psychologists know that multitasking involves switching rapidly between tasks rather than actually performing multiple tasks simultaneously.” JWT has decided to dub the trend Distraction as Entertainment. (But I am having a hard time finding any good articles on their definition.)

From the report:

“…almost half of kids (47 percent) report texting someone ‘often’ or ‘sometimes’ about what they are watching on TV—an activity that was almost unheard of five years ago.”

The device people were using together with TV is their mobile phone, up to half the kids are using it to keep in touch with friends and exchange ideas in this context.

This is interesting, with almost one in two kids talking with their friends about what they are watching on TV, and using the telephone – not a desktop/PC based social networking application – inspires to think about two things:

1. The Laptop + TV living room idea is great, but the potential in Mobile+TV might be even bigger. To be frank, the popular TV-event + Facebook chat integration really isn’t that impressive, and seems more like a “lack of imagination band-aid”.

2. Sending SMS is just a choice in regards to the goal of their communication – it’s simple, cheap or free and communicates short exchanges beautifully. Which means that we should be able to introduce new concepts based on a solid understanding of the context itself, low technological barriers and great rewards.

In my personal experience with games, it’s not the national or big games that create the best engagement; it’s the local ones. And not “local” in the geographical sense, but in a social sense, were one engages an existing group of friends. This is not because friends play more with friends online in comparison to with strangers, but because it enables the real-life dimension. Where the game does not exist exclusively online, but creates a form of social worth (a value defined by Jenkins) that ignites exchanges when the group meets socially in real-life. It becomes a valuable currency even when the game is not played. Something to talk about and share, at school, work or other gatherings outside the computer.

Using the game, not to play it online, but in order to share an experience that brings value both to their digital and real worlds (even though it’s the same place), it is the strongest enabler.

As JWT rounds of their blog post:

“Content creators can turn this trend to their advantage by layering a multitude of media into entertainment, producing an immersive experience designed for simultaneous consumption and engagement.”

And I would ad, that it’s when media, and especially TV, not only plays on what’s happening and created inside media, but also plays on the activities, dimensions and social groups that exists outside media – and with additional ideas and activities outside simultaneous – it becomes really powerful.

To sum it up; its when the layering (as JWT defines it) not only includes media but also includes a real world component, includes the idea of the engagement branching of and existing outside the TV time slot, and adding a local, social dimension, things become interesting. And even though the PC/Laptop is a brilliant tool, the mobile phone might be a better instrument in this context.

Three projects, that all bring different but interesting aspects into this line of thinking; Parking Wars, MTV Backchannel and Fantasy premiere League. (unfortunatley I can’t find any examples with mobile)

And of course, this does not only apply to TV events, but all events. As events are like products; an invitation to become a part of something valuable…

Redscout and PSFK just published a collection of some the of video responses to their Spur series; “designed to provoke and inspire the world of planning”.

Aki Spicer, Director of Digital Strategy at Fallon heads it of with a longer segment, before a range of contributors from all over the world ad their valuable ideas. Luckily I get the honor of ending of the whole thing of (maybe it was the “thank you” :)

Please enjoy..

Social media is not social media. Facebook is an operating system, not a destination. Digital is not a set of silos, its an eco-system of solutions and ideas.

When the term Web 2.0 got replaced by Social Media the landscape started filling with experts (brilliant people) on dialog and participation. Which is great, but to an extent we seemed to narrow these ideas to a limited set of outlets, to be found inside the artificial category called social media platforms.

But there is something about participation, connecting and making things that seems so much bigger. And coupled with the notion that the communication world pre-Internet might not have been the century long standard, but just the result of a recent set of devices introduced to the market, which had changed the way we communicate for a shorter term.

These devices (broadcasting devices) have been affecting how we as humans communicate, but now the Internet is bringing us back to the way it used to be – more human like.

This idea might be completely idiotic, or absolutely true. And if its the latter, then there is no social media silo. And participation, connecting and making things need to be de-siloed, and we need to start combining them with everything (including broadcasting) to a much larger, intrinsic degree.

The focus here is on intrinsic.

Not more so have I seen evidence of this than from this brilliant presentation by David Gauntlett, who in the first half of the video below combines the effect of modern devices on human communication (and more) with philosophers like Illich and Morris.

And it is absolutely brilliant. Go visit makingisconnecting.org for more.

(video found via JohannesKleske)

Does advertising need to restate its role in the marketing communications industry? And what is the role of strategy, or planning, in this process?

By request, and in response to the brilliant Spur series by Redscout, hosted by PSFK, I have added my thoughts on the future of planning.

My point being that advertising is getting dangerously close to becoming nothing more than a small niche in the marketing communications portfolio. And, as is pointed out by several of the brilliant people interviewed in the video, it’s business model is looking more and more like an execution model rather than an conceptual overarching strategic model.

It is my claim that if advertising is to regain some of the portfolio it has been losing over the past 40 years, it needs to concentrate on servicing a larger perspective of the strategic sphere of marketing communications, and strategists, or planners, are one of the more important products in this new model.

- And in that process maybe even understand that their main product – the idea – is not as important and valued in this portfolio as it ones was. It is a problem that people still hail the VW ads of the 60s and 70s as the best ever, when they are clearly representing a completely different communications landscape than what we are faced with today.

First, the Spur episode on the future of planning:

And then, my own, and tad uncomfortable, video response.

Is media in the wrong business? Looking at business model imperatives it seems that it is…

In the excellent book Business Model Generation, by Alexander Osterwalder & Yves Pigneur, there is a chapter on “unbundling”. Where the concept is that there exist three fundamentally different business types, and that a company should separate these types from each other to avoid conflicts and undesirable trade-offs.

From the book:

“The concept of the “unbundled” corporations holds that there are three fundamentally different types of businesses: Customer relationship businesses, product innovation businesses, infrastructure businesses.”

And then continues:

“Each has different economic, competitive, and cultural imperatives. The tree types may co-exist within a single corporation, but ideally they are “unbundled” into separate entities in order to avoid conflicts or undesirable trade-offs.”

Under the imperative “competition” there is an interesting revelation: Where product innovation focuses on being employee centered, and customer relationship management on being highly service oriented. Infrastructure management has its competitive imperative set to “Cost focused; stresses standardization, predictability and efficiency”.

Now looking at these three models I would say media definitely puts itself in the infrastructure category – which also might be its biggest mistake.

Media used to be in the infrastructure business, providing mere opportunities to traffic messages from the brand to the consumer. But today this is costing media dearly. Having little or no unique content, having standardized every piece of real estate available for the brands to purchase, and thus removing any advantage in the bidding war. Thus resulting in trying to sell its identical product by having the cheapest product (or the biggest discount) and flooding its editorial content with advertising in order to compensate for the low price per. unit sold.

Its sometimes seems like media doesn’t see that basic marketing economics (scarcity and demand equals higher price) also applies to their business.

If media is in the infrastructure business, it is in the wrong business.

I would suggest media position itself to the relationship business, and be selling completely different, more scarce and more valuable products to brands.

What I would like to see is a change of business model focus. From infrastructure destruction, to creating valuable relationships – providing new and interesting products for brands to sponsor in order to increase the value being created between media and the participant – as opposed to flooding the available real estate with messaging as uninteresting and generic as the format it has chosen to be presented in.

After publishing the slideshow Seven actionable marketing trends about a month ago, I asked if there was an interest in an expanded version of the slideshow. Elaborating on each trend and including some references and quotes from the insights behind them.

Unfortunately it has taken me some time to put this together, and I do apologize for the delay. But now the deck has been published via slideshare.net.

I would like to state that the goal of the document is not to work as a coherent presentation, but rather using the slideshare format to comprise and present a collection of valuable ideas that I felt was/is relevant in regards to each trend.

I hope you find the presentation useful, and that there are stuff/slides in there that proves to be inspirational.

As always, if there are any questions or comments, please contact me and I will do my best to reply.

Also, find most of the individual slides available under CC license on flickr:
http://www.flickr.com/photos/everythingnewisdangerous

Find the presentation below, or here:

How come design for technology is so inherently anti-human that we had to invent a whole new industry around it just to band aid the wounds created by having the wrong focus in the first place?

Behavioral Psychologist Donald Norman has been quoted saying:

“Each time a new technology comes along, new designers make the same horrible mistakes as their predecessors. Technologists are not noted for learning the errors of the past. They look forward, not behind, so they repeat the same problems over and over again.”

When it comes to design for interactive platforms it seems that the knowledge from existing design practices have been overlooked in favor of designing interfaces more eager to ease the technological development budget, rather than accommodate the human mind.

The problem with this is that it prohibits technology of immersing invisibly into peoples lives, because the technology itself becomes far to visible. We need to understand that it is behavior that initiates innovation, not technology. It wasn’t speed that made broadband the game changer, it was how it removed technology (the dial-up and cost model) from the process of going and being online.

This first film is by Berg and Mag+, its a case study presenting some insights into and visualization of e-Magazines. It presents the kind of thinking needed in order to bring technology into peoples lives

It seems we are at the end of a period where interactive design was mere decoration. Where algorithmic logic and robotic rationality shaped the reasoning behind the interfaces trying to engage people in services, content and marketing.

Design is for humans not robots. And humans should force technology to adapt and evolve, not the other way around.

Both videos where found at the brilliant blog Mobile User Interfaces by TAT, which together with BERG provides a lot of brilliant insights and inspiration into the future of design on interactive platforms.