The Price of Progress

December 20th, 2011

I split my Christmas shopping this year between buying from local merchants and buying on line from Amazon. I feel good about shopping local, and I feel a little bad about shopping at Amazon. I believe I feel this way because I am told that it is “good” to support local merchants and that Amazon is the “big bad retail killer”. And, yes, it may be, but let me relay a story.

I was looking for two specific books that I hadn’t been able to find in my local bookstore or at Barnes & Noble. I went onto Amazon and found the books. One was originally $40, marked down to $26.40. The other was $26, marked down to $17.16. I would also qualify for free shipping. Wanting to support my local bookstore, I called them and asked if they had the books. No, they didn’t but they could order them for me, the price would be $40 and $26. Now I’m pretty sure that they were going to go to Amazon and get the books for a total of $43.56, but they would still be charging me $66 – over 50% more than they were going to pay on Amazon! I mentioned to them that I could get the books on Amazon for a total of $43.56, but I wanted to support my local merchant, what should I do? I expected them to say something like, “Thanks, we appreciate your business, how about I give you 10% off “. Instead they said, “I guess you have to follow your conscience. You know it isn’t fair that people are buying from Amazon.” What????
Society is moving ahead, Amazon will indeed destroy the brick and mortar bookseller (look at Boarders), perhaps this isn’t “fair”, but didn’t your mother ever tell you “life’s not fair”?

Let’s take a look at all the other businesses that the computer age has destroyed or is destroying.
• Newspapers – they may still be around, but for how long?
• Conventional media in general – With DVR’s, On-Demand, Apple TV, Hulu, etc. how long will commercial TV as we know it exist? The same could be said for terrestrial radio, at what point will satellite radio take over?
• The video/DVD store – gone.
• The record/CD store – gone.
• The CD! Within a few years, music will be produced on MP3 exclusively.
• Film — Kodak has stopped making Kodachrome film and the company is in serious danger of filing chapter 11. http://www.forbes.com/sites/marketnewsvideo/2011/12/19/eastman-kodak-shares-dip-on-funding-report-suit-news/
• The United State Post Office is in danger of going out of business. As a matter of fact, if it was a private enterprise, it would be out of business!
• The land line telephone, or even more archaic, the phone that is connected to the kitchen wall.
• If we want to go further back, does anyone remember the typewriter –a business staple up until the mid-80’s, and when was the last time you sent a fax?

I don’t know if it is “fair” that these businesses and industries have been replaced, but it is the price of progress.

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When is all this Media too Much?

December 1st, 2011

Do you feel like you are being pulled in several directions at once? Do you have trouble concentrating? Join the club! And, no, you probably don’t have adult ADD.

Our culture commends and reveres people who are always on the go. If we aren’t busy and multitasking, we feel like we are unproductive or wasting time! How crazy is that? Trying to do two things at once (or three or four) results in nothing being done well. Sure, sometimes circumstances arise that make us really busy and require us to do two thing at the same time, but this shouldn’t be the way we live the majority of our lives. And if we are on overload during our leisure time, something is really wrong!

If we try to do everything at once, we actually accomplish nothing. The vast multitude of media options certainly has compounded the problem. The other night, I was watching two TV shows at once. (One was on the DVR and the other live. I watched the live show, then paused it when the commercials came on and went to the recorded show, after a while I went back to the live show, and fast forwarded until I got to the content, watched the segment and paused it again when they took a break, went back to the DVR’ed show, etc.) Besides this, I was reading and commenting on the tweets for the live show, checking my Facebook feed and playing Words with Friends (which sometimes included texting messages back and forth). Needless to say, I don’t even remember what I was watching on TV, and I lost all of the word games!

I don’t believe this proliferation of media has truly helped us, nor that we are better off now than we were 10 years ago because we can watch TV, tweet, post updates to Facebook, e-mail, text, play games, and talk on our own personal phones — all at the same time! We are fragmented and distracted. Our concentration is slipping. But, the real question is, what sort of condition will we be in 10 years from now???

Posted in Communication, interpersonal communication | 4 Comments »

Is it The End of the World as We Know It?

October 27th, 2011

Today, I saw this photo on a friend’s facebook page. Can radio really be dead?
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Certainly the heyday of radio has come and gone, and if it is indeed dead, I want to say a few words. I believe that each generation has their own special relationship with the medium. Radio broadcasting began in 1920 and it soon became the medium for entertainment. rog-cathed

During the depression, people listened to baseball and President Roosevelt’s fireside chats. In the 40’s families gathered around the radio to listen to soap operas, quiz shows, Burns and Allen, and Jack Benny. Edward R. Murrow reported from London as it was being bombed by the Germans during World War II.

The 50’s brought us Alan Freed and the birth of “Rock and Roll”. AM Radio thrived with Bill Haley, Elvis, Chuck Berry, Bobby Darren, Patsy Cline, Ronnie Specter, and many other stars.

In the 70’s AM radio gave way to FM. It all has to do with the frequency, amplitude and phase of the radio waves, but the result was clearer sound. — As a child of the 70’s I am partial to this era, in my mind it is the Golden Age of Radio. Although, I’m sure those of you who grew up in the 50’s and 60’s may disagree!

I’m sure the kids of today, even though they have their i-pods and satellite radio still have their favorite radio stations and announcers (they really can’t be called disk jockey’s anymore as they don’t play anything resembling a “disk”).

Radio is our companion. We listen at home, while we are at work and while driving. We listen for the music, for the news, the traffic, the weather and even political talk and self help information. No, I’m not ready to give up on it!

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Social Media is not Rocket Science!

August 26th, 2011

It’s obvious that “Social Media” is here to stay–whether it is Facebook, twitter, MySpace, LinkedIn, Bing, Google+, Foursquare or one of the thousands of other social sites. The specific vehicles may come and go, but the concept of social media is now deeply entrenched in our world. So when are we going to stop talking about it like it is some sort of new-fangled phenomenon? That ship has sailed!

We all know the rules…be true to yourself, don’t post anything that will embarrass you in years to come, or get you arrested, don’t use the medium to sell, but rather to engage in conversation, etc., etc., etc. Enough with the “how to” and “why is social media important” and “why your business should use social media” articles. We know how to use it, and we know it is another important means of communication!

Facebook, twitter, etc. are now as prevalent (or maybe more so), as radio, television, newspapers, e-mail, snail mail, the phone call and all of our other means of communication. We don’t see blog posts., ewsletters and webinars on how to property use the telephone or e-mail. We get it!

If you want to learn about social media, sign up for a Facebook account, a twitter account, check out reviews on yelp, join in a conversation on LinkedIn, check in with a location service. Reading about it won’t teach you as well as actually using the medium. Could you imagine teaching someone about television through a seminar? No, give them a clicker and a week and they’ll understand. It is the same with social media. It is what it is, and that is different for each individual user.

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Digital Etiquette according to Millennials

July 29th, 2011

I read an interesting article in Advertising Age, Five Tips for Marketers From MTV’s Study of Millennials’ Digital Habits which gave some interesting insights from an MTV study on Millennials digital habits.

In order not to make a digital faux pas in the eyes of Millennials (these are not only your kids, but also your future best customers), it will be wise to be aware of their digital etiquette.

Don’t post too much or respond too quickly
If you over share you will be hidden, un-liked or even de-friended! If you respond too quickly and too often you will be perceived as overeager and uncool. The article points out that millenials are “very concerned that if they responded too quickly, they’d look like they had nothing better to do.”

Politics and religion are still socially taboo subjects.
Only about 1/3 of those responding to the study felt that politics and religion were “appropriate (subjects) for public posting online.” It points out that rather than posting their views on these subjects directly, millennials express their views by reposting content (video, funny clips, music) that express a political and/or religious view with which they agree.

Keep your image fresh
The study states that Millennials are constantly working on their on-line image and identity. 90% of those surveyed reported that they “constantly and fluidly shift between chosen identities in order to present their “best selves and lives.” One-Third of the respondents said that they “always modify their photos before posting online.” A few respondents even reported attending events just to have photos to later post.

Each of the many digital and social media option has its own purpose
Older generations had the letter, the phone call, later the fax and email (see All Communication is Social) Millennials have IM, My Space, Facebook, Twitter, Yelp, Pinterest, and hundreds of other platforms, and they use them for specific purposes — the phone for emergencies, IM for working together on schoolwork, etc. And each means of communication relates to real life in its own way, for example, “sending an email is like going out to dinner and Facebook is like getting coffee or just seeing someone at the store.” You don’t want to assume or imply too much intimacy by emailing when you should have facebooked!

Us older digital media users (boomers and yes, gen-xers) can learn from this study. Businesses should heed this advice as well in order to not alienate the Millennials. These “kids” are their future best customers.

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Timing Matters for Twitter and Facebook Posts

July 26th, 2011

There is an interesting new chart illustrating the “science” of social media timing. A summary of the key findings as they pertain to Twitter and Facebook are:

• Most people re-tweet around 5pm eastern time
• The highest click through rate (CTR) on tweets happens at noon and 6pm
• To achieve the highest CTR, the study recommends tweeting 1-4 times per hour!

• Most Facebook posting occurs at noon and after 7pm
• Saturday is the day with the highest Facebook usage
• To achieve the most likes, 1 post every other day is recommended.

So it appears, that most people tweet and/or post on Facebook at lunchtime or after work.

And, if you have to tweet 1-4 times an hour, or 12-48 times during a 12 hour day, twitter posts (tweets) have a very short life. Unlike Facebook where people will scroll through their news feed, if someone doesn’t see your tweet, they aren’t going to scroll through thousands of tweets to look for it!

Source: http://blog.kissmetrics.com/science-of-social-timing-1/?wide=1

Posted in facebook, social media, twitter | 1 Comment »

All Communication is Social

June 1st, 2011

There really isn’t anything new about Facebook or Twitter. We are social beings, we like to communicate with each other. The technology has allowed us to communicate differently, but communicate is what we’ve always done. Shortly after Homo Sapiens graced the scene, we developed language to communicate with each other, and a thousand or so years later we developed written communication. The rest is history!

Up until fairly recently in human history, our communication consisted of the hand written letter. It took awhile to write, a week to get to the recipient, and another week or so for the response to get back to us. Oh the waiting. Do you remember checking the mail box and the feeling of excitement when there was a letter from a friend?

A century or so ago, the telegraph allowed us to communicate more quickly, and the then the telephone introduced instantaneous oral communication across the miles. We could talk in real time to someone who was physically far away from us. Back when there was one phone line in the house, I’m sure you remember running for the phone, saying, “I’ll get it”, because just maybe the call was for you!

In more recent times, along came e-mail and we could type up a quick note in a few seconds, hit send, and if the recipient was at their computer, they could write back in just a few minutes. Even if they weren’t there, we often got a response within the day. With e-mail, we can even send a note to a group of people at once. Plus, just like opening the mailbox and finding a letter, there is still some excitement about having an e-mail from a friend in your in-box.

Next came Instant Messenger. As it’s name says. Instant Messenger allows us have instant conversation, (somewhat like we do with a phone call). We can write and respond sentence by sentence. With IM, we can even have different conversations with multiple people simultaneously. And yes, when we are working at our computer and we get a little IM sound letting us know that someone wants to chat, our curiosity is piqued and we stop what we are doing to read the message.

The written letter was one-to-one communications, e-mail was mostly one-to-one, but could be one-to-many, IM opened up the many-to-many communication channel. Then along came “social media”, like Facebook and Twitter and we have the ability to communicate to hundreds, even thousands instantaneously. And. unlike earlier forms of communication, we may not know many of the people at the other end of our communication, certainly we may not don’t know them all very well.

But, whether it is a written letter, telegraph, telephone, e-mail, IM, Facebook or twitter, the basic premise is the same — human interaction. The technology has changed, and often we get so wrapped up in the new technology that we lose sight of what it is we are doing … we are communicating with others; we are being social.

Posted in Communication, interpersonal communication, social media | No Comments »

I want an I-Pad!

April 15th, 2011

The I-Pad is so cool.  People pull them out at meetings and they just look so connected, wired, in touch, so cutting edge.  But, how much more productive are we now that the I-Pad and other tablets are becoming commonplace?  Well according to a survey of 1,430 tablet owners by Google’s AdMob Division, the number one activity was gaming!
84% use their tablet for Gaming
78% Searching for information
74% E-mail
61% Reading News
51% Listening to music/watching video
46% Reading e-books
Of course people use their tablets for more than one task, and so these numbers don’t tell the whole story. Perhaps if we looked at the time people spend on each activity we’d get a clearer picture. And it would be interesting to see if these numbers mirror the activities people perform on their laptop and/or desktop computer.

And just where are these tablets being used? 82% eport their primary use is at home, and only 43% use their tablet more oten than their desktop or laptop. However, 77% report that their desktop/laptop use has declined since getting a tablet.

All that being said, I still want one!

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Can Apple overtake Android?

February 21st, 2011

Do you have a Smart Phone? Nationwide, smart phones make up 27% of the mobile phone market. If you are in business, it is almost a necessity. Today with business people wearing several hats, multi-tasking and running in and out of the office, the smart phone helps them keep up with their co-workers and clients, without staying at their desk. I know my smart phone is a business essential. Nationwide, smart phones make up 27% of the mobile phone market.

Here are some interesting facts and figures. Among the big three smart phone operating systems, RIM (Blackberry) is still number 1, but the Android platform is quickly catching up.

According to Comscore RIM had 31.6% market share in December 2010, but this was down from 41.6% in December 2009. Google’s Android has 28.7% market share — up from only 5.2% in 2009. It appears that the Android system will overtake RIM very soon.

Interestingly, Apple’s market share remained mostly flat at 25%. Will Apple’s move to Verizon increase their share of the smart phone market? It appears that the Verizon users opted for the Android phone while the Apple was unavailable to them. (Rather than switch over to AT&T and the I-Phone). It will be interesting to see if Apple can pull these Verizon customers from their Android phones. And if so, will Verizon customers wait until their current plan allows them to upgrade to a new phone, or will they pay the full price and go for the Apple?

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Couponing–A Tried and True Method of Advertising

February 20th, 2011

Coupon advertising. Its an old, tried and true form of advertising. As a matter of fact, one of my first jobs in advertising was selling shared mail coupon advertising to local businesses. As a consumer, I know when the Val-Pak envelope comes, while I’m not actually excited, I certainly open the envelope, thumb through the coupons and pull out the ones I may use. Generally speaking these are a great deal for the right type of advertisers–restaurants, salons, gyms, etc. The redemption rate is typically around 0.5% Of course the greater the offer (say 50% off vs. 10% off) the higher the redemption rate.

Today with the internet, email and mobile phones, a host of electronic coupon companies have sprung up — Groupon, Eversave, etc. The marketing principle is the same as Val Pak, or coupons in the Sunday newspaper supplements. Offer a discount to get a potential customer to try your product or service. The concept is the same, the difference is the delivery method (e-mail) and the fact that people are actually purchasing the coupons.

These electronic coupons work because the advertisers is required to give a great discount, and people are willing to purchase the discount up front. A business has to give a discount of at least 50%. Of course they work! If someone pays $25 in advance to get half off a product or service, most likely they will redeem the coupon!

The drawback with Groupon et. al. is that the amount of coupons delivered is unlimited. The business has no control over the number of people who take them up on their offer. Combine the 50% discount with the 50% commission (on average) paid to Groupon and a business could go out of business if enough people take them up on the offer!

Let the advertiser beware!

Posted in Advertising | 1 Comment »

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