Culture: January 2009 Archives
Grant Owens who's a friend of mine at Razorfish and a planner wrote a piece titled, "Looking for a Pulse Online in 2009." He's a planner who believes that there's a lot we can learn from radio. In his language, radio holds the pulse because unlike the iPods it keeps us alive, and connects us to our communities and the world around us. It's not a lonely device.
Interestingly, he explores that concept to put forth the notion that in 2009 it is technologies that have a pulse that will succeed. Those are technologies that are social but instantly reactive too. For him the technologies that have a pulse include activity feeds, micro-blogging, distributed sampling, live streaming media, data centric media devices and real time analytics. He asks companies to focus on pulse taking products this year.
I like the concept but what I find most interesting is that the first two technologies that he mentions are social applications - activity feeds and micro-blogging. Arguably, some of the others like distributed sampling also leverage crowd-sourcing an inherent social concept too. I feel that the most pulse taking technologies are the ones that are social - we're interested in each other pulses (to use that language). That's what drove the social media explosion. Something else for us to consider. Philosophies around social will take many different forms in 2009 and may not be instantly recognizable as being tied to social. That's a good thing too. What do you think?
For the other Slant articles that cover microblogging, cookies, online video advertising and email marketing click here.
We got a few nice shout outs over the last few week or so. The first of course was AdAge and AgencySpy picking up on the news that we won the Mercedes Benz Agency of Record pitch today. This is obviously very big news and we're very excited about it. Its going to be fun having Mercedes as a client here in New York.
Future Changes highlighted Going Social Now as a blog to watch in 2009. It was one of 15 blogs highlighted. Also included in the list was The App Gap, a group blog on social in the enterprise that I also contribute to.
The Buzz Bin ran a post on the 25 Signs that You've Got a Strong SM Consultant or Agency. The third item listed was that the agency looks at social in the context of broader marketing objectives. We were sited as an example of an agency doing that. It is nice to see that our philosophy about social media is being noticed).
Newsweek asked us how we'd help the Republican Party revitalize its brand with Gen Y audiences using social media. I worked with the office social media leads and the ad creative team to send some ideas their way. In support of print media, I'm no going to give the idea away here (hint its the iPhone app). Buy a copy of the magazine and see for yourself! <i>Follow up to the post - Newsweek has published the ideas only now. You can find them here.
I'm back from vacation now so expect regular blog updates once more. I hope you had a wonderful holidays.
