Jaffe Juice

Old Spicy Beans

Last night I did my monthly stint on The Beancast, joining host Bob Knorpp and 3 other panelists (Duanne Forrester from Microsoft, Dan Goldgeier from Adpulp and Partners + Napier and last but definitely not least, Helen Klein Ross AKA Adbroad)

It was a great way for me to catch up to what's been going on in the industry over the past 2 weeks, while I was in South Africa at the World Cup!

We discussed:

• Old Spice in context of popularity vs effectiveness
• Luxury goes e-commerce (an arrogant industry finally gets with the digital program)
• Digital Ad Dillema (clicks still prevail)
• iDisconnect and iMortal with respect to Antennagate
• Comcast doesn't care? Frank Eliason leaves the company for the Citi

Listen and/or download directly here

JJTV #91 - Is WPP to social media what oil is to water?

Sir Martin Sorrell, who heads up the WPP Holding Company had some strange words to say about social media at a recent conference.

I'm not sure he's looking at social media the right way at all (paid media versus non media)

Link: Article featuring Sir Martin's words

Spread the word:

• Share JJTV with Sir Martin, your co-workers, colleagues, friends and family
• Tweet or RT: New JJTV - Holding companies are all about scale; does that hurt them with respect to social media? http://bit.ly/sirmartin
• Subscribe to the show via iTunes or YouTube
• Leave a video comment

SxSW and how you can get on dot TV

We live in a world of retweeting (in the olden days it was called plagiarism - ha!) and so in that spirit, I'm going to pretty much cut 'n paste fellow Powerdista, Greg Verdino's post, based on it's eloquence, succinctness and my writer's block.

I'll add my 2c at the end...

Powered's newest client is VeriSign. You might know them as the company that doles out dot com or dot net domain names; sure you actually buy your domains from Go Daddy, Domain.com or wherever but it's VeriSign that handles the registries themselves.

So at SXSW this year, we'll be kicking off some interesting programs to raise awareness and registration of .tv domains. Video is hot and getting hotter, and .tv is the only logical domain choice for content creators who are serious about generating video programming, growing their viewing audience and building their video brand. Here are some of the things we're doing over the next few days to help you get started if you're new to video or get seen if you're already a video vixen.

southby.tv: First of all, you'll want to check out southby.tv. Whether or not you're at SXSW, it's a great place to get a look at some of the cool stuff happening in Austin -- shot by the real people who are in the thick of things. As we say on the site, southby.tv is a "living diary" showcasing video content from the insiders at the festival.  Which brings us to point #2 -- if you're at the event and have your video camera or phone in hand, your content can be part of the southby.tv line-up. Just hit the site, follow the submission instructions and your clips may be chosen by our curation crew.

Here's my contribution:

You can be the Next .tv Star: We're not just giving you a chance to have your SXSW clips appear on our site; we're giving you a chance to hit the weblebrity big leagues (eww, yes, I ready said weblebrity.) All over the event, we'll be shooting audition videos for anyone who wants a chance to win a cool prize package and a shot at being a correspondent for an upcoming Best of .tv web show. The prize includes an all expense paid trip to San Francisco where you'll spend the day backstage at Revision3 and get a private video production coaching session from Diggnation producer Dave Prager, one of the guys behind one of the web's most widely watched video series. And of course, you could become a Best of .tv correspondent...

Read on for more details about how you can audition in Austin over the next few days. Or visit southby.tv to submit an audition directly (and to learn all the rules and legal stuff, of course.)

The .tv Street Team: We'll have a team roaming the event, shooting audition videos for anyone who wants a shot at being the next .tv star and handing out must-have swag. Be on the lookout and make sure you say howdy (or whatever it is they really say in Texas...)

The Bigg Digg Shindigg: .tv is sponsoring Saturday night's Live Diggnation event (7pm at Stubbs BBQ). We'll have a big ol' tent where we'll be shooting auditions for the next .tv star and doing some other fun stuff, so be sure to check it out. If you can't be there, you can also watch the fun when the Diggnation episode hits iTunes.

Special Offers: And finally, to coincide with .tv's SXSW presence, we will have special offers for anyone looking for an excuse to get going with video. Check out the offers page on southby.tv for your shot at freebies and more.

I'm a proud dot teeveer with Jaffe Juice TV AKA jaffejuice.tv into the 80's (episodes) and bearing down quickly on my lethargic audio podcast's 130's. When I launched JaffeJuiceTV, it was really a no-brainer that this needed to be on .tv and that's why I registered it off the bat. For some reason, it's not that intuitive to everyone....but it *should* be.

Think about it for a moment: these days everyone is on video. Every single device has a camera (well except the iPad) built in and the easy of creating high quality video from a Flip Cam to a Web Cam is literally a red circle away.

My point is simple: register it now before somebody else does. Who know one day someone will come up to you and say, "don't I know you from dot teevee?" Hey, it could happen....

JJTV #80 - Grammy Fail

See no evil.

Hear no evil.

Speak no evil.

And a social media debacle. What a wasted opportunity

#fail 

PS Where was all the hyped social media in last night's Oscars?

Additional links:

• Ad Age: To regain luster, oscars get a social-media makeover

Spread the word:

• Share JJTV with the nominees, your clients, co-workers, colleagues, friends and family 
• Tweet or RT: New JJTV - See no evil, hear no evil, speak no evil. Grammy #fail - http://bit.ly/grammyfail
• Subscribe to the show via iTunes or YouTube
• Leave a video comment

Thank you to HP for sponsoring this show. In addition to their Employee Purchase Program (see below), you can also participate in their very worthy Create Change program. In a nutshell, for every purchase you make at the Direct Store, HP will donate 4% of the total product purchase to support a range of charities in the areas of conservation, education, enrichment systems, healthcare support, disaster recovery and the battle to fight poverty. These charities include: WWF, Junior Achievement, American Red Cross, CARE, Susan G. Komen, Make-A-Wish Foundation®, and DonorsChoose.org

You're invited to participate in HP's Employee Purchase Program (EPP) for friends 'n family discounts on the full portfolio of HP and Compaq consumer products. Here's what you need to do:

• Visit www.hpshopping.com/employee/jaffejuicetv and register to join the program
• You'll need to enter in EPP company code: 3807
• You'll receive additional exclusive offers if you sign up for the Monthly EPP newsletter

Speaking

Whether you're interested in a bit of inspiration, motivation, degradation or deprecation, I'll keep you on your toes and challenge you to face change head-on with a healthy dose of insight, foresight and prescription.

My primary signature keynote presentations are loosely based on my three books, "Life after the 30-second spot", "Join the Conversation" and hot off the press, "Flip the Funnel: How to use existing customers to gain new ones."

Here are few presentation blurbs:

Flip the Funnel: How to use existing customers to gain new ones

What if we got it all wrong? What if we've been going about marketing completely the wrong way? In this provocative keynote, Joseph Jaffe will outline how retention can become the new acquisition for businesses today and in doing so, literally transform the way companies go to market and establish a critical competitive edge and advantage. Using his new “flipped funnel” methodology, Jaffe will outline the notion of customer experience, introduce the 10 new rules of customer service and present a social media-powered customer activation model that harnesses the true potential and impact of customer-generated word-of-mouth, reviews and referrals. If “getting more from less” has become your new mandate, you won’t want to miss a new approach which presents the possibility of doubling your revenues whilst halving your budget in the process.

Retention is the new acquisition

For too long loyalty, customer service and relationship marketing have been thought of as passive, reactionary and/or defensive tactics. No more. In a world that is becoming ever more transparent, networked and dynamic, listening and responding has become a cultural imperative. But the real question is, “with whom?” And the answer is an unequivocal, “our customers”. In fact if you think about it, without our customers we have no business; we have no budget to invest in acquisition or awareness efforts. If this is in fact the case, why do we continue to throw good money after bad wooing strangers with no overt or explicit affinity towards our brand? Why do we relatively ignore our lifeblood – our customers? What would happen if we turn conventional business practices on its head and in doing so, elevate CRM, loyalty and retention marketing to head of the class; from back to front office; give it its deserved seat at the strategic planning table? What might the result be? Flip the funnel and you’ll find out for yourself!

The new customer service

This is no longer your grandfather’s customer service. With the explosive and exponential advances and evolution in technology innovation and adoption, companies have limitless opportunities to connect with their customers in unprecedented ways. No longer considered to be a cost center, but indeed a strategic imperative capable of building the business – efficiently and effectively – from the inside-out. Using a revolutionary “flipped funnel” methodology, author and thought leader Joseph Jaffe will introduce and outline how customer service 2.0 – and its umbrella parent, customer experience – can become a powerful 1-2 punch capable of profoundly differentiating a brand from its competitors, establishing powerful relationships with customer evangelists and influencers and more importantly, arming this base with tools, techniques and incentives to spread word-of-mouth, recommendations and referrals to social networks, trusted peers and communities.

Join the Conversation

Continuing the conversation (literally) about how new forms of marketing are transforming the way brands are introduced, nurtured and strengthened, Jaffe introduces “what comes next” i.e. the rise of “conversational marketing”. The central message is simple: There are literally millions of alive, flawed, human, passionate, influential and authentic conversations going on around you right now: isn’t it time you joined in? The fact remains, all the marketing communication, media, messaging and advertising in the world can only get you so far. At worst, breaking down the door (there will be repercussions!) At best, getting a foot in the door. After which, conversation takes over. Through the power of community, dialogue and partnership, marketing can be a conversation; a welcome guest in the homes, experiences and lives of our consumers, if – and only if – certain principles, pathways and philosophies are put into practice.

Getting more from less using the power of innovation

It’s a double-whammy – a catch-22. You see the world changing in front of your eyes – consumer empowerment, democratization of creativity and content production, loss of control, reduction of trust in a new social media playing field dominated by new phenomena (microblogging, lifestreaming), new players (Facebook, Twitter), new products (Amazon.com Kindle), marketplaces (iPhone App Store) and technologies (Nintendo Wii) – and all the while, spinning out of control at the same time. You’re under increasing and unprecedented pressure to increase sales or at the very minimum maintain status quo, amidst never-ending budget cuts and scrutiny. Innovation and Experimentation are vital and yet seemingly out of reach. Well here’s the good news – investing in “commitment-based” marketing and coping during a recession are not mutually exclusive. In fact, they’re interconnected. By “joining the conversation” through leveraging the power of community, dialogue and partnership, you’ll quickly find yourselves on the right side of the “punch” – the 1-2 punch of growing your business and differentiating your brand from your competitors.

Life After the 30-Second Spot

Centered around his first book. Jaffe discusses the demise of the 30-second spot as the primary communications vehicle and in its place, the rise of bold alternatives to traditional advertising (the “93 colors”) such as interactive, experiential marketing, long form content, communal marketing, gaming, and on-demand viewing. You’ll be introduced to new models such as E.P.I.C., R.E.A.C.H., C.O.S.T. and R.U.E., amidst a cacophony of real-world illustrations and pragmatic and prescriptive advice on how to win in a world where the only constant is change.

There are plenty of other presentations as well, including - but not limited to:

• Integrating Interactive into the Integrated Mix
• The New Consumer
• Web 2.0 (uggh)
• New Marketing for a New Consumer

Of course, there are also custom presentations should you so desire.

You'll probably want to see me in action as well. Here are a few clips to keep you busy:

You can also check out my web video show, Jaffe Juice TV, for a bit more juice.

In 2009, some of my speaking engagements included (some private events not shown):

• Google Client event (Sao Paulo, Brazil and Mexico City, Mexico)
• ANA Senior Marketing Think Tank (Dallas, TX)
• ANA Marketing Accountability Forum (New York City, NY)
• PRSA Conference (San Diego, CA)
• Coca-Cola Workshop (Moscow, Russia)
• ADMA Forum (Sydney, Australia)
• Satmetrix Client Forum (San Francisco, CA)

In 2008, some (private events not shown) of the conference/events I spoke at included:

• Richmond Events/Digital Forum Keynote (London, United Kingdom) 
• Association of Canadian Advertisers Annual Conference (Toronto, Canada) 
• SNCR Forum Keynote (Napa, CA)
• Danish Post Conference & Award Show (Copenhagen, Denmark)
• Televisa Corporate Offsite/Conference (Mexico City, Mexico)
• ANA Integration Conference (New York City, NY) 
• Weekend Media Festival September (Rovinj, Croatia)
• ExactTarget Conference (Indianapolis, IN)
• DMA Keynote (Las Vegas, NV)
• Evenpro Seminar (Caracas, Venezuala)

My bio which you can download here: Download Joseph Jaffe Bio February 2010

Some headshots:

 

 

 

 

If you'd like to inquire about availability and terms, please drop me an e-mail: jaffe [at] getthejuice[dot] com

The Power(ed) of Social Media

 
WOW! It really is possible to keep a secret in a world where there are no secrets (only information you don't already have). I just got back from C.E.S. in Vegas and after hanging out with people like GaGa, Levar Burton, Brent Spiner, Scottie (Monty), Jeff Cutler, Chris Heuer, Brian Solis, Chris Brogan (not really), Bobbie Scoble (not really), Jeff Pulver (not really), Leo (really), Justine (i), Sarah (almost told her), Rick (sorry), Steve Rubel, Rohit (how was the Adult Film party?), David Churbuck and much much more, not a word or whisper about 00011110 (the binary equivalent of the magic number 30).

Sooooooo......after 3+ years after founding and building crayon into a social media strategic playa, today I get to announce that crayon is now the "powered crayon" (hat tip to Forrester's Augie Ray) AKA crayon has been acquired by Austin-based Powered, Inc.

Along with crayon, Powered has also acquired Portland-based StepChange, gurus extraordinaire in all things social networking and mobile apps, widgets and presence (fan pages etc) and New York-based Drillteam, demons in engaging brand loyalists and advocates in the form of offline and online seeding and activation programs.

I should probably also tell you that Powered itself is a leader in terms of creating, building and sustaining branded communities online.

You don't have to look too hard to connect the dots and see that the concept of "community" is an incredibly strong common thread that brings all four companies together - whether this lives in the form of social networking or a tupperware party.

We don't want to resort to the usual plethora of poppycock and bravado (other than solely mine of course) and we're mindful of empty promises - especially in the social media space. So for now, let's just say that the four compaines have combined to build - what we believe is - the first full service social media agency with scale.

Let me stress this is a work-in-progress and that we intend to prove ourselves and let our collective work speak for itself. We already have an arsenal of case studies, but now it's time to let 1 + 1 + 1 + 1 = 30.

I'll be constantly updating a list of resources that you can refer to for more information, including the social media press release and various blog entries from both inside our company (CMO Aaron Strout's post here, including answers to several FAQ's) and outside.

Update: Additional press/blog mentions:

• crayonista Greg Verdino's post
• MediaPost
• Adweek
• PaidContent.org
• Austin Statesman
• Web Strategy
• Agency Spy

For now, I wanted to do 3 things:

1. Share with you why I sold the company I started
2. Talk to you a little about my passion for what I think we can achieve
3. Give thanks

I actually don't look at this as selling (or certainly selling out), but rather "buying in." Whereas most company owners, founders or execs sell and as quickly as you can say "golden handcuffs", bolt....I'm joining a company that I think can do amazing things - not only for its shareholders and clients, but for the industry at large. More on that in a jiffy.

I have to say that being an "entrepreneur" or "small business owner" is probably the hardest and most worthwhile thing I've ever done professionally. I guess I was both when I left the traditional agency world in 2002 and formed my jaffe, LLC army-of-one, but when you have partners, employees, members or professional "dependents," it's a different ballgame altogether.

To explain why I sold crayon is to explain to you why I started crayon in the first place. I've always believed that it's easy as pie to be a prognosticator or pundit. Writing books or giving speeches about dumb companies making dumb decisions is just part of perpetuating the status quo. This is probably why there's so much (justified) backlash against self-proclaimed social-media experts. I didn't want to be part of the problem; I wanted to part of the solution. I wanted to be part of a team again. I wanted to turn strategic and creative ideas into reality and in doing so, prove that the vision in my books was credible and capable of moving mountains.

I believe that we did just that in the past 3 years for clients including the likes of Panasonic, Coca-Cola, Kraft Foods, American Airlines, H&R Block, Colorado Technical University, Facebook, ooVoo, GyPSii and much more.

So now it's time to kick that up a few hundred notches. I call it taking one step forward in order to leap forward 100 more steps in the process.

Those of you who know me are well aware that I'm "financially challenged". I'm also no operational guy. I'm an Interruptor and I wanted to focus on doing what I love and what I do best, as opposed to the incredibly complex and demanding rigor of running a company.

...and that's exactly what's happening. I get to ramp up my evangelism big time, focus on maximum damage and destabalization within the lethargic industry, whilst simultaneously helping our clients reap incredible rewards from implementing commitment-based programs that are head and shoulders ahead of their competition.

On the way into Vegas, I had a chat with my friend, Sean Finnegan, who heads up all of Starcom Mediavest's Digital Media. We debated whether business needed a dedicated social media department or the industry needed a dedicated social media agency. The counterargument was that social media was too important to be siloed or specialized into a vertical capability. I was itching to tell Sean the news, which quite clearly emphatically communicates where I sit on this debate.

Put succinctly, what percentage of traditional agencies TODAY truly gets (and delivers against) digital, let alone social? I rest my case. How on earth can we expect traditional agencies to master both digital AND social at the same time? On a different level, I'd argue that the same could be said about digital and P.R. agencies when it comes to social. And I did in this Adweek article and as you can see in the comments, the truth hurts.

Bottom line: social is both a horizontal and vertical imperative and I intend to do my part to help Powered become one of (if not the) leading social media agency that can deliver broad-based and profoundly transformational social media solutions to brands that need them.

With my third book, "Flip the Funnel" coming out in about a month's time, I expect to invest a good chunk of my time promoting and talking about the book; dividing my time between writing, speaking and conference events on the one hand and working closely with the group's clients on the other. I'm giddy with excitement about the rise of customer experience and how "retention can become the new acquisition" (more on that soon) and will be devoting much headspace to the central themes of the book.

I also intend to rededicate myself to blogging...yes, blogging. To hell with Posterous and Twitter. I'm all about the renaissance of blogging. I also plan to revive Jaffe Juice - the New Marketing Podcast, starting with a live podcast on Tuesday morning at 9am EST with all the new members of the Powered family talking about the momentous event. If you'd like to listen in and participate with questions, comments or challenges, here's the link. And last but not least, I'm going to continue building out Jaffe Juice TV (check it out why don't you and subscribe on iTunes or via YouTube)

Whereas Drillteam and StepChange will continue to operate as independent entities, crayon is very quickly rolling up into a bundled Powered package. That said, crayon's strategic solution of consulting, planning and advisory services will continue to be offered (only now with more oomph, diversity and scale).

And so finally to thanks. I wanted to start off by thanking my family for putting up with me working 7 days a week for the past 7 years and spending so much time on the road.

I want to thank my family of crayonistas: Greg, Jane, Amadeo, Kate and Gary for putting up with me until the end. In particular, I have to single out Greg Verdino, who is my right hand and without him, I would be lost.

I want to thank all of our clients. Your belief, support and most importantly, friendship, is invaluable beyond words. One of my most incredible memories from crayon will be the EQUAL partnership and bonds formed with our clients. I simply despise how so many agencies have a superiority complex and feel their clients "don't get it"; they do. Big time. I totally expect these relationships to continue; with genuine personal and professional respect as a mandatory.

Finally, I want to thank all the ex-crayonistas who played their part at some point in building this company, but for whatever reason moved on. As you can see there are a lot of them and I think this emphasizes how difficult it is to run a business that is so strongly reliant on talent and properly invest and manage the cultural, interpersonal and yes, even political dynamics that are part of the job. Every single person here is a star and many have gone on to achieve fantastic things since leaving (which is something that I'm pretty proud of). Your color from the big box will always remain "retired": Gary C, Francis, Shel, Neville, CC, Aaron, Michael, Chris, Steve, Scott, Melissa, Seni, Deb, Earl, Adam S, Adam B and Gary K (and if I left anyone out, I apologize and will you add you in ASAP.)

So I guess that's it for now. I'll be spending the next day or two trying to respond as much as possible to comments on this blog, Facebook, text messaging, e-mail, cell and yes, of course Twitter (there's a Twitter press conference today at 2pm EST, hashtag #powered). I hope you can join tomorrow's (Tuesday) podcast recording at 9am EST. I hope to see many of you and continue this conversation in person at some point....sooner rather than later. Perhaps at SXSW or next week's MarketingSherpa e-mail conference in Miami.

These are exciting times and the tide is going to rise like no end to float all boats that embrace change, and sink those that resist it (because of all those holes)

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.