Do It Wrong Quickly

While searching ebay for a dead detective writer who is the subject of a blog I’m creating, I  discovered Mike Moran, author of  Do It Wrong Quickly.  It’s a gem about today’s marketing. 

I bought the book, browsed some chapters, then started in for a serious read.  Mike is an IBM Distinguished Engineer who has more than 20 years experience in search and related Web technologies.

The book contains  a  ton of new information.  The writing is breezy in the style of the Dummies books (you know, with a lot of asides or humorous remarks in parentheses that sometimes work and sometimes don’t), but I like that. It keeps the reading light. 

Do It Wrong Quickly was just published so it will take awhile for the word to get around but this just may be the marketing book of 2008.  It’s almost a Bible of “ digital strategies and tactics” (from The Forward).

His core message is that traditional media is still important but it’s rapidly taking a back seat to Internet marketing, and marketing on the Internet morphs almost on a daily basis.  Therefore, we don’t have time to hash things  out in meetings over a period of weeks or months.  We have to act now.  Since change is constant, we must try new things, experiment,  discard what doesn’t work and try more new things. 

Then he proceeds to detail how to go about this.  Mike understands three really important things:

1.        Since a lot of Web marketing is free, our most precious commodity is our time.

2.       Some people are resistant to change.  He goes into detail about how to help people (including ourselves) accept change.

3.       Marketing is now a conversation and our audience members vote with mice.

Maybe more later as I move through the book.  But don’t wait for me.  Check it out.

 

Random Sunday Thoughts

It’s an icy Sunday afternoon with the wind chill around 15 below but the dogs don’t care.  So we play ball until I’m frozen. Then I come in, thaw, and write. 

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I’ve spent hours on the Web, reading blogs and following links and learning stuff I never intended to but am glad I did.  I have Brad Ward to thank for that. I started checking out some of his favorite links until TO (technological overload) sent me for another coffee.

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I think about the state of consciousness of different generations.  I still sit in amazement that I can post a comment to the Word Press guys and my photo is searched, found and uploaded with my reply.

I still find it oddly comforting that in this international, instant communication world we address each other by our first names, even though we’ll always be strangers. (That’s an oversimplification that I’ll temper in the future).

I still look at being able to record something with a web cam the size of your palm and upload it instantly as just short of miraculous.

At the same time, to a six-year-old it’s part of the daily routine.  

I don’t know how to reconcile those points of view.  The way younger generations take all this stuff for granted is the way it should be, I suppose.  But are they losing something in the process?

I feel like I have. While whole new worlds open to us everyday, I don’t read books (printed books) as I did years ago.  I used to read two or three books a week.  Now I read 20 blogs  a day and one book a month. (Gregg Braden’s The Divine Matrix and John Dunning’s The Sign of the Book are the current ones).

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Steve Jobs dismisses Amazon’s Kindle as an instant failure because Americans don’t read anymore.  I’ve talked about that in previous posts.

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I’ve signed up for Tweet Scan though I’ve never used Twitter.  But as a marketing person I need to follow as many conversations as possible about Mansfield University.

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 D.W. Simpson has an eye-opening study  that provides one more piece of evidence that high school students search for colleges in a completely different way today.

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If I were in the movie/TV industry, the writer’s strike would have me scared sick. 

Why? 

The public is not complaining.  No clamor for new episodes or new shows.  No mass angst about no new movies.  That loss of viewership that’s been going on for several years is going to continue.  The irony is the strike is about the very industry that’s eating away at traditional entertainment and the longer the strike, the more time we spend on the Web. I’ve said before that once people experience the freedom of downloadable or streaming content, they don’t back to the restrictions of traditional media.

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Now, back outside with the dogs — a reality check in more ways than one — then some ginger tea while I read something I can hold in my hand.

                                                           

 

A Four-Graph Post on Videos & Blogs

I’ve mentioned Karine Joly CollegeWebEditor blog several times over the past year. If you haven’t subscribed, you should.

I was just catching up on blogs and her site was one of them. In a recent post she shared information about a survey conducted by the Pew Internet and American Life Project on the increasing use of video social sites. It’s excellent information for any PR person trying to initiate or bolster an online video project program as part of your marketing mix.

Also in the past I’ve mentioned some of my favorite blogs. It occurred to me that you probably have favorite sites, also. Since blogging is all about sharing I would love it if you would send me the urls to some of your “must-have” sites and I’ll share them with this blog’s readership.

I know you’re really really busy but it just takes a couple minutes and it should be fun. It will certainly give us an idea of the variety of folks who visit this blog’s world.

Study:Internet Has Flattened Traditional Recruitment Funnel

A new study by Noel-Levitz adds to the Web 2.0 challenge that we face. “Building an E-Recruitment Network: Connecting with College-Bound Seniors in the Era of MySpace” tracked the responses of more than 1,000 college-bound students.

According to the study the “growing influence of the Internet on recruitment has ‘flattened’ the traditional funnel.” Students no longer limit their searches to campus Web sites and are turning to social networking sites to supplement their information gathering about colleges.

There are several categories in the study:

“Social networking and e-recruitment: “hot” or “not”

“Keep e-recruiting your accepted students”

“E-communication trends”

“Attitudes toward college Web sites

“The top ten online activities on college Web sites: rate your institution”

“Five Strategies to take away”

 

This is an important report for marketing and admissions folks. It reinforces what we’ve been reading for a couple years: the audience is creating and defining marketing strategies.

Footnote: This study is the latest in a series of projects which also should be required reading for us in PR and marketing.

 

 

The survey was conducted by Noel-Levitz, James Tower and the National Research Center for Collegeand University Admissions

My Flip-ping Experience

I’ve been giving a lot of thought to The Flip video camera since I last wrote about it.   As soon as my daughter started using hers that we bought her for Christmas,  I of course started thinking of ways we could use it in the office.   When D.W. Simpson of The University of Toledo commented that her office has two, that sealed it.

Now the Flip site lists 13 national retailers who carry it.   I went to our neighborhood Radio Shack to keep my purchases local.  They had never heard of it.  I asked the owner to look it up, which he did.  I ordered three. 

I had some credit at our nearby  Staples so I dropped by there and asked one of the sales guys for the Flip.  He had never heard of it.  He looked it up and asked me a bunch of questions about it.  I ordered one.  I think he did, too.

 My daughter went to her Anchorage  Best Buy and they hadn’t heard of it.

I went to the Flip site  and they seem to have gotten a decent amount of publicity throughout 2007. But the retail chains don’t seem familiar with it.  Where’s the disconnect?

This is a classic example of good promotion with no follow-up.  It’s also an example of information overload.  The Flip was reviewed by Mac Life, as Matthew commented

USA Today and a slew of others reviewed it. .   Even Oprah endorsed it.   But publicity needs to be constant, even when you have something cool-looking, useful and easy to use. 

But the biggest sin is the fact members of three chains had never even heard  of it, let alone know they were selling it.  This is from a Pure Digital Technologies news release:

To complement its simple and affordable consumer devices, the company partners with leading retailers to distribute its advanced processing technology. The Pure Digital Imaging Platform is installed in over 9,400 one-hour processing locations nationwide, including CVS/pharmacy, RiteAid Pharmacy, Ritz/Wolf Camera Centers, Duane Reade, and Longs Drugs. The Flip Video family of products will be available in over 10,000 retail locations in time for the holidays, including Amazon, Best Buy, CompUSA, Costco, OfficeMax, Sam’s Club, Target, Toys ‘R Us, and Wal-Mart.

There should have been a marketing campaign to educate and motivate the participating retail chains.

Despite this, my feeling is that this pocket-sized camera is going to be the next big thing.  My son seems to think it will take another couple years to take off since many folks  use their cell phones for videos. We’ll see who’s right.

We’ve become a recording society and the company with the coolest looking, most user friendly device wins.  My bet is on the Flip once they get their marketing, education and product placement in order.

I’ve looked at different videos produced with the Flip and, for the most part, I’m impressed with the quality.   (The quality varies with the producer, obviously).

Whether they take off or not, I’m with D.W.  Every PR office should have a couple and we should be carrying them with us around campus along with our digital still cameras and audio recorders.

Here are some links related links I checked out today.

This one for its enthusiastic endorsement.

This one for the unintended humor

And this one for the information and unintended humor.

And finally, this narcissistic masochist used his Flip to record his teeth being cleaned!

 

Footnote:  I’m glad D.W. commented on my previous  post.  I checked out her blog and subscribed. 

http://higheredmarketing.blogspot.com/

Assessment Time

It’s been nearly a year since I initiated this blog. 

I remember sitting in my office on a frigid February evening with my Jedi Web Geek, Jared, filling out the required WordPress entries, then spending the following Saturday creating my first post.

My goal was to write about stumbling around the Web 2.0 world, sharing thoughts, discoveries and other blogs that I find interesting.  For the most part I’ve done that with occasional wanderings.

Checking my WordPress stats, the most popular blog is Lonely Girl 15—Sex, Mystery and Web 2.0.

I suspect it’s being hit by a lot of young males who are disappointed once they begin reading it.  I’ll admit I put the S word in the title by design as an experiment.   But I won’t do it again.  I’m not interested in numbers as much as I am in an audience who cares about the subjects I write about.

Google Communicates with the Dead  and Dead Part 2 and Google Maps Heaven and Hell have been visited continually since I posted them .  I wrote them as a satire, but with all the progress ubiquitous Google makes they just might try it and they just might pull it off.  If that’s the case you can write to that French professor who failed you and tell him you’re glad he’s in Hell.

I’ve written nearly 100 posts and now it’s time for assessment.  Is the higher ed marketing blog helpful?  Entertaining?   Does it contain useful information?

Are there things you’d like me to explore and write about? 

I need to hear from you. 

Blogging is Fun & Time-Consuming

Blogging is fun and educational (my God, I make it sound like software Tinker Toys!) but it’s also time-consuming.  While writing the last post about new technology, I wanted to create a lot of links that would be helpful to you.  That was the fun part.

 I wound up spending an hour reading reviews of the Zoom H2. 

I poked around Google until I stumbled upon Mark Zuckerberg’s address about Facebook’s platform and applications.  I spent a half hour watching his presentation.

In nearly every case, one site linked to another and another.  The post I thought would take a couple of hours wound up taking four days.

Notice this post has no links.

Things I Wish I’d Done and Think I’ll Do

Information processing, technical implementation and solid content are the three biggest challenges we have.  That grand pronouncement is based on my experience and that of others I’ve talked to.
Here are things I wanted  to do in 2007 and didn’t:
-Get to know my Mac that I bought last year. -Install Leopard on my Mac.
-Really understand the capabilities of most Google programs.
-Really understand all the capabilities of WordPress 
-more fully utilize my iPod. -Better understand my Sansa media player.

-Understand all the capabilities of my Zoom H2 and H4 digital audio recorders

-Produce more videos.
-Explore and understand the capabilities of Facebook.
What does all of this have to do with marketing my university?  Oh, everything.
While poking around the Web doing research for a new blog I’m putting together, I read several entries about all the independent bookstores that have gone belly up.  When I go to sites like PC World, their articles  and blogs are loaded with links, and more and more of the links are to videos posted on YouTube.
Facebook sites –the good ones — have become little websites.  While doing research for this post, I found a presentation by Mark Zuckerberg on the new Facebook platform and applications.  It’s worth the time to watch it. 
The way we search for information and the way we communicate has shifted so radically and it’s so unbiquitous that I feel silly for even pointing it out.*
We have to understand and use Facebook to communicate with the audience we’re seeking.  As I mentioned in a previous post, with the advent of Flip Video, communicating with video is going to grow tremendously.
Google continues to quietly and consistently revolutionize the way we get, store, distribute and, yes, mashup information. I’m typing –no, keystroking –this on Google Docs which I’ve come to depend upon because I can add to it, revise or  from any computer — home, office, hotel.
The iPod is a hard drive that can do 90 percent more than we use it for, (reminding me of the scientific footnote that we only use 10% of our brain).
I have used my two Zooms with great success, turning presentations and concerts into podcasts, but I need to use them more.

The one thing that doesn’t change is the importance of good content.
Beuwolf,  Hamlet, Huck Finn and Forest Gump, live because they’re good stories, human stories.
That’s what’s become of utmost importance in all marketing, especially higher education.
But while I’m searching for, or creating, content, I’ve got to do the above, plus try to keep up with whatever else Sergey, Larry, Bill, Steve, Mark and others offer in ‘08.
What are some things you wished you had done?

*At the chiropracter’s, I sat next to a 14-year-old girl, both of us in neck traction. She spent her 10 minutes texting friends. I passed the uncomfortable time with my Sansa player and Sony earbuds, listening to Fresh Air.