Jaffe Juice

The Launch of the Living in High Definition Podcast

This is a little backwards, because I still want to spend some time over the next couple of weeks outlining the single most signficant project we've worked on at crayon, namely Panasonic's "Living in High Definition" community and commitment.

We've had the pleasure and privilege to work with Panasonic North America on a truly landmark effort - actively demonstrating that Living in High Definition changes everything.

And what better way to bring this to life than through a High Definition video show, presented by one of the real stars of the program, Laura Pollack, a mom and a community member.

The LiHD Podcast is a bi-monthly snapshot of the best of what the community has to offer. It's a showcase which operates on three levels:

• Internal i.e. within the community - motivation for members; a showcase of recognition
• External i.e. outside the community - a portal or window into the community; a source of promotion and membership acqusition
• Both - a source or resource filled with tips, tools, tricks, how-to's and inspiration

Making this podcast happen are the fine folks over at For Your Imagination (FYI)

So take a look, subscribe to the show and while you're at it, join the LiHD Community.

Living in HD Podcast, Episode 1 from Living In HD on Vimeo.

Crack in the Box

Jack in the Box (which I'm told is best described as a perfect cross between White Castle on Crack mixed with Stephen King's IT Character) recently dipped its cone into the social media snark-infested (oh I am trademarking that - full attribution required from hereon end) waters with it's "conversation starter" Super Bowl commercial commercial.

Bringing back shades of Frontier Airline's Flip the Dolphin, JITB created a website - Hang in there Jack - which included 81,000 get well messages from "concerned" patrons, including videos and songs. There was also (of course) a blog, which included comments like these:

• You all are morons. I like checking out most dot com websites .but yours is the epitomy of the worst. Your humanity is absurd
  
• Makes no difference to me, because Jack never came up here to feed us New Yorkers. We should grill Jack like a Pig and eat him.
• Your food makes me poop

That's where it gets interesting and where JITB might (I stress might) have succeeded where Skittles failed. With the exception of vulgarity and profanity, of which poop is apparently neither, the company let the conversation extend and evolve (or devolve) as it might...

No question that irreverence is a major part of this brand's make-up and personality. Couple that with a more open-minded, pragmatic and honest approach to dealing with consumer generated content and the "conversation", and you have a pretty authentic mixture of good and bad...peacefully co-exiting side by side.

According to the LA Times, the six-week "Hang in There Jack" campaign (Secret Weapon Marketing, Santa Monica) was a remarkable document: a 360-degree social media event that mocked even as it exploited the power of YouTube, Twitter, Facebook and Flickr. Along the way it leveraged irony to the breaking point with "viral" cellphone and faux-paparazzi videos, ring tones and texting. Among the crowd-sourced content were 27 get-well videos from fans, some quite brilliant. A man in Hawaii bought Jack's size-14 Bruno Magli shoe on EBay for $910. Now that's buy-in.

Clearly there was leadership, pre-sell and management of expectations by and from both client and agency in this case. JITB execs contended that the social media component of this program generated impressions (4.8 million video impressions for example) which would have cost "three times as much" using traditional media.

The other obvious ingredient in this taco was strategy (repositioning; relaunching) as hard as it may seem when you read a blog post written by a fictional demented clown titled "My post coma plans"

Jack's back, baby. Jack's back.

To pay or not to pay, is THAT the question?

Forrester just released a report titled "Add Sponsored Conversations To Your Toolbox," authored by Sean Corcoran.

Kmart gave some bloggers a free shopping spree in exchange for a blog post about the experience — a practice we call sponsored conversation. With appropriate protections for disclosure and authenticity, this practice will take its place alongside public relations and advertising activities in the blogosphere. Marketers should take advantage of sponsored conversation as an entrée into the online conversation. To succeed, you should get to know the bloggers you plan to work with and set expectations across your organization.

What's interesting is how Forrester is pretty deliberately putting this approach into a category of its own, alongside it's predecessors or cohorts (depending on your position), advertising and P.R. and in doing so, plays a part in terms of legitimizing or formalizing an emerging practice.

His colleague Jeremiah Owyang covers it here and Brian Morrissey at Adweek covers it here. Marshall Kirkpatrick from ReadWriteWeb takes a strong counterposition here.

I was interviewed for this piece by Sean, as was Chris Brogan, who participated in the aforementioned Kmart program, sits on the board of IZEA - the company behind the program (and the one formally known as PayPerPost). Chris responds specifically to Marshall with this post.

Here's the thing. In my time in this space thus far in a formal capacity (i.e. crayon), I've worked on two pretty public and well received programs: My ooVoo Day and the Panasonic CES program. In the former example, both Marshall and Chris were participants; in the latter one, Chris was one of the bloggers. I'm not sure I would call either of these programs "sponsored conversations". In fact, crayon calls them "tactical hooks" - a mash-up of the best (practices) of the advertising and social media worlds. Put differently, we believe that influencer outreach should be treated with the same consideration, commitment and investment as a traditional communications program from both a planning and production standpoint.

It's imperative to give influencers both a reason to believe and a reason to behave. Too often, we are lazy, greedy and gratuitous in terms of what we expect from bloggers and the like and essentially what we expect back from them, relative to what we put in, in the first place.

In a personal capacity, I've participated in both the Nikon D80 giveaway and the Sears program (part 2 of IZEA's Kmart 1-2 punch). In both cases, I wouldn't say this remotely smacked of PayPerPost; nor would I say my conversation was sponsored. In some respects,this is no different than a "celebrity" (TRUST me, I'm using that loosely) sponsorship - from loaning a star diamonds on Oscar night to adorning Tiger Woods with a cacophany of swooshes in exchange for mega moolah.

I guess the point is where on the continuum does blogger or influencer outreach fall. Personally, I believe we should be calling this "blogger/influencer outreach" and not "sponsored conversation". Let me also be very clear (and you can see from the definition), that I don't think Sean meant this to be taken in a negative light. I spoke with him and we had a great conversation. I think the real ambiguity and problem lies with us (i.e. the readers of the report; the commentators and so called social media experts etc).

Part of the problem lies with the fact "sponsored conversation" sounds a bit like "paid search" does it not? Putting two terms which seemingly mean exact opposites together and in doing so, creates a rather jarring disconnect.

Part of the problem as well lies in the endless, boring and inaccurate comparison between the new class of content creators (bloggers if you wish) and journalists. They're not...at least for the most part.

And so we come back to the two core issues:

1. Should bloggers be compensated in any way, shape or form for their time, effort, energy, passion and contribution. The answer can only be a resounding YES, with standard terms and conditions (disclosure, transparency etc) which make both common sense and business sense.
2. Is expecting bloggers (in return for aforementioned compensation) to write, talk, post, create etc about their experiences, reflections, ideas, participation crossing a line? The answer here is a resounding NO, provided there is adequate disclosure and transparency.

Come on people. Grow up and wisen up. This is a nascent industry and space which is learning and maturing all the time. What we have here is in many respects no different to how the world was, but in many respects is also incredibly and completely different. It's time to get off our high horses and open our minds, instead of stubbornly holding on to and exhibiting self-righteous, hypocritical and close-minded positions.

Whatever you call them, "sponsored conversations" are here to stay. And just like the vast differences between crap and mediocre creative (lumped together) and inspiring/breakthrough creative, so too will there be a marked difference between influencer programs that stand out from the crowd or get trampled by it.

CES La Vie in HD!

I'm back from my first CES and besides the side effects of acute lack of sleep and the looooong road to recovery ahead, the buzzing in my head is the best kind possible.

If you've been following my blog or my tweets, you'll know that I went to CES as Panasonic's guest, but also as their partner. With regards to the former, I had the pleasure of participating in a Spotlight presentation to talk about the future of Web Marketing. With regards to the latter, my company - crayon - worked with Panasonic to bring along a diverse and talented group of individuals to the show.

Going into the show, one might have referred to them as blogger, podcasters, vloggers, content creators, or even the slightly cruder but industry appropriate, influencers. However, having been a part of the experience, I would most certainly replace all of those terms with these descriptors: Humans, consumers, customers, Moms and Dads.

(photo courtesy of Steve Garfield of SteveGarfield.com)

Pansonic's whole positioning centers around the harmonious balance and interconnectedness between technology and humanity (ideas from life; ideas for life) and no where was this more prevalent than at CES.

If you think about it, every day we are forced to be schizophrenic - separating our personal lives from our professional lives. In business, we fight every day for integration - but what is integration really? Is it print, TV and online playing nice with one another? Or is it something a lot more profound, namely the ability to join forces with our customers - as partners; the gift of being able to participate in their lives and communities (and to be welcome); the propensity to engage in meaty, healthy discourse and dialogue with them?

...'er yes. That's it. That's what Living in High Definition is all about.

For me, the highlights (if video isn't available yet, it soon will be) of CES and this program were plentiful. They included (from the sublime to the ridiculous):

1. Making 6 new friends (or extending existing friendships) in the form of Chris, Steve, Stacy, Ponzi, Melissa and Vicki and in particular the time when we sat down and talked about this experience together. It's not often you'll get to see video like this that gives you a look inside the Kimono, but then again, there was pretty much no restriction in terms of what was on and off the record. All I can tell you is that this was 100% unprepared and unscripted...and there was some additional conversation once the camera was turned off (not intentionally) that I will remember for the rest of my life.
2. Meeting the Calandro's (yeah, thanks for that!) and the Pollak's
3. The dinner we had with the 6, together with our Panasonic clients - and in particular the moment when we got to share birthday cake with 6-year old Matthew Calandro. This is probably one of the seminal moments in my career....where everything I wrote in "Join the Conversation" came to fruition. Indeed, marketing can be a conversation. I saw it with my own two eyes. Cluetrain was wrong, only limiting this to markets. We - the marketers - are as much a part of the equation as our customers are.
4. The time we spent with Panasonic North America's Chairman, Yoshi Yamada. There will be some video of this soon to share. Mr Yamada was amazing...his empathy, genuine interest and care is something that you just can't fake.
5. My spotlight presentation
6. Meeting Tom Dickson, CEO of Blendtec and the face behind, "Will it Blend?"
7. Meeting Mario (of the Mario + Luigi duo) and coming back to a framed photo of us in my son's room
8. Meeting Philip Scoble. It's a long story :)

I'm very honored that people are embracing this program so much. Brian Morrissey wrote this piece in Adweek, although I'm not sure I agree with him that this is "Advertorial 2.0." The content creation component was just one aspect of this program and I'm pretty certain that everyone who participated - directly or indirectly would vehemently agree that - even with a 2.0 slapped on it - the crude description of advertorial doesn't come close to capturing the genuine emotion and relationship component associated with this effort.

My full Flickr set is here, but if you want more....just search for the LiHD tag (on Flickr; on Twitter; on YouTube etc)

Additional posts/recaps from Greg Verdino, Chris Brogan and the Calandros.

Join the Political Conversation - part 1

This Yom Kippur, why not show off your political affiliation to the big guy upstairs with either the Obamica or the McCippah.

Created by Shmuly Tennenhaus, a self-proclaimed Serial Entrepreneur based on eating Cocoa Puffs for breakfast, it's another example of consumer generated content (Cafe Press style) with a distinct political flavor this time.

Shmuly has received quite a bit of buzz about his collection, which includes the Vippah (along with lipstick mark to boot) To be sure, Shmuly has an abundance of Chutzpah, including lines such as "I hope to sell a lot of these Kippahs so that I can afford to buy a racing car game for my Nintendo Wii" and "No earmarks were requested for the creation of this Yarmulke."

He was kind enough to send me my very own Obamica for the High Holidays.

Visiting the brand E.R. - the difference between onslaught and onslaught(er)

Andrea Vascellari sends me this Greenpeace video response to Dove's Onslaught (their follow-up to Evolution...and not to be confused with Slob Evolution)

In his post, Andrea notes this as a perfect example of how public reputation can be smashed down in less than 2 minutes (1m27 to be exact)

The video is in response to this piece:

It's a far cry from Slob Evolution, which was a playful and irreverent spoof of the ground-breaking Evolution video, which seemingly ushered in a new era of thoughtful and purpose-based brands that put authenticity, transparency and social responsibility before corporate greed, profits and acquisition.

Until now...

On one hand, this sends out the clearest of messages to faker brands looking to "get in on the conversation" by sending out a stern warning: you gotta walk your talk if you want to join the conversation. Think like an advertiser and attempt to cut corners and you will be found out and duly punished.

Put differently, if you want to commit to community, dialogue and partnership, you need to have your entire house in order first.

Now that said....I would be remiss by dumping on Unilever if I didn't point out this timely update from Greenpeace itself:

UPDATE: Thanks to the staggering public support for our international Dove campaign in April 2008, Unilever has now agreed to play their part in saving the Paradise Forests of South East Asia. As the biggest single buyer of palm oil in the world, Unilever has a special responsibility to help clean up the industry that's behind so much forest destruction.

They have agreed to support the call by Greenpeace for an immediate moratorium on deforestation for palm oil plantations. They have also agreed to urgently contact other major companies calling on them to support the moratorium.

This is the first success in a broader campaign to secure real change on the ground in South East Asia -- to stop the palm oil industry from destroying the Paradise Forests. Greenpeace campaigners will work with Unilever for th next six months (starting May 2008) to bring together a major coalition of companies to make the moratorium a reality. We will see at the end of this period how things are progressing and if we need to change our campaign approach.

The update is both in the information box on the YouTube video post, as well as in the comment thread. It certainly alludes to the fact that Unilever is listening and although being taken to task, is prepared to change or at least take steps in the right direction.

That said, I wonder how many people will notice this "fyi" and in the process, how much brand reputation damage will occur?

The power of consumer generated reporting (CGR)

A deserved winner of the week, CNN recently announces that they've hit a record with 2.5 million unique users in June. If you want to know more as to why I think iReport is great, listen to the podcast.

Immortalizing Memories - The Linkory Tale

Forget the Long Tail, this is all about the Linkory Tale. You see the problem with stories living on forever, is that they need to be remembered and written down first.

Enter Linkory, one of crayon's newest clients. Officially:

Everyone has memories.  We share them with friends and family throughout our lives. Linkory.com is the only place that makes capturing and sharing memories fun, easy and free.

Your posting of a particular memory will act as the first link in a chain. Others in the global community with similar experiences will add to the chain. This powerful and exciting Linkory process will reveal the complete recollection of an event, enhance the experience for all participants, and generate an historical sequence. You will reunite with family and friends and connect with others who share common or related memories.

Recall huge world events:  Where were you when 9/11 happened, what were you doing when you heard about the death of Princess Diana or when the Berlin Wall came down? Were you in Myanmar in September, 2007?  Post your photographs and describe your visit to the 1969 Woodstock Festival, your attendance at the Simon and Garfunkel concert in Central Park or the Olympic Games. Share your experiences with others who were in your military unit , at your university, or at a summer camp with you. You can choose to make your memories public, or you may limit who may view and contribute to your Linkory.

In this small world,  Linkory.com is indeed a powerful collaboration and social networking space that connects all of us, globally.

For the first time, the world's history is being written in real-time, collectively and un-edited.  Linkory.com is the future of history.

Linkory isn't a social network per se; instead it provides a suite of conversational tools pivoting around the simple (yet profound) act of memories; life experiences; personal history or just personalized accounts or interpretations of events as they happened.

Like many start-ups in the conversational space, Linkory's success will be determined by the number of memories and the proficiency and extent to which people tag, link, share, embed and comment accordingly. In many respects I see Linkory as a very busy hub, with millions of commuters passing through on a continual basis. On the other hand, I see the Riddler's giant memory bank in the sky (although less sinister)

Either way, I love the idea of people coming together to share in moments that united, divided, mesmerized or shocked us. It can be as serendipitous as "Remember when South Africa won the Rugby World Cup in 1995" to "where were you on 9/11?". In the former case, two people could have been at the same game at the same time, but sitting in completely different places in the stadium...and yet today, they live next door to each other in San Diego. Or with 9/11, it could be a myriad of people from around the world expressing their pain and shock in unity.

Scott blogged about it here on the crayon blog. He also created a memory for Blogger Social '08 (you know, the one where I feigned illness in order to maintain my high maintenance primadonna reputation!) You'll notice btw that Greg (blogged about it here and thanks to his post, Bon Jovi is seared into my memory for all the wrong reasons!) added to this memory (one of the features/functionality associated with the interface)

I've already added my personal memory (as fresh as Friday), documenting my swearing in as an American citizen. I've also included a few photos and a video.

Check it out and perhaps add your own personal immigration experience as well.

Of course, you can always add your own memories here and be sure to provide a link to your own memories on this thread. I'll send a signed copy of my book to the one that inspires me the most.

Macbook Air Parody

It's always dangerous when marketers act like humans and pesky consumers. Here is luminary Mitch Joel's attempt to convince us that Sony Vaio's are just as good at interoffice memos as Macbook Airs.

I know which half of your advertising is wasted...

I'm guessing it's the half spent against the half of all US consumers frequently engaging in consumer generated content:

NEARLY ONE-HALF OF U.S. MEDIA consumers are frequently creating online content for others to see, according to findings of a new survey commissioned by Deloitte & Touche USA LLP. The finding...marks a 12 point escalation from a prior survey commissioned by Deloitte in the spring of 2007, challenging the conventional assumption that online content creation is limited to a niche group of technology-savvy individuals, the company said.

Source: MediaPost/Deloitte