Digital Influence Mapping Project

How to Create the Next Video on the Web: Creative Marketing Models

This post is part of a 5-part series. How can we all be successful with the next wave of video on the Web whether you are a show producer or a brand? Creative Marketing Models are one of four important priorities. 

Previous posts talked about getting the show and the audience engagement right. But none of this matters unless you have a innovative and effective advertiser model. Pre-roll, post-roll, surround banners and product integration seems to be where we are at right now. Advertisers value click throughs and impressions tied to views. But even views are open to interpretation. Revision3 recently made a higher commitment by defining views as complete views. It's likely that few other producers do that.   

Beyond Product Integration

The product integration in magazine format shows like TMI weekly  and EpicFu are the most interesting models. Still, I am not sure that product integration in narrative story is as flexible or impactful. It's one thing to put Ford vehicles in network TV shows but quite another to drop product in the background of a niche dramatic video online. We need more.

Engagement

Advertising value is changing. Some marketers understand that and are working hard to put a value on engagement. The time has come for show producers to get more creative for how they deliver engagement with the brands that support them. We need to think in terms of "marketing" not simply advertising for the brand involved in a video program. If you want to ptoduce a show or are already doing so, what is the story you tell advertisers about the ad opportunity? If it's just impressions or even click-to-action your wasting everyone's time. If you are talking about engagement via product integration than you are on the right track.

But you need to go farther. The most entrepeneurial online producers I know come from the Joss Whedon school of creating a show as multimedia brand. That means the video program is but one touchpoint and experience. Email updates and alerts, merchandise stores, related media like music and pictures, live events (like Diggnation's meetups) are all part of the the engagement. Weave sponsors in there. Show them solutions at all levels of the funnel - drive some qualified leads or relevant inquiries. Make them a friend of the show brand and therefore a potential friend of the particpants - then your getting something done.

Idea Bar #12 Next Video on the Web: Threadless Meets Next New Networks

This post is part of a 5-part series. How can we all be successful with the next wave of video on the Web whether you are a show producer or a brand? Crowdsourcing topics is one of four important priorities and is technically one of my Idea Bar posts.  

This series started with this core idea. That's what makes it part of theIdea Bar series which is full of good ideas - each driven by expertise and naivete. Ultimately this simple idea led me to want to throw out my own model on how niche video programs can succeed online.

Threadless as you all likely know is the quintessential Cinderella story for crowdsourcing. T-shirt designers post designs, the crowd votes them up (or not) and the top designs are produced and sold.

Why not do this with your show? In the previous post on Focusing on Value to Niche Communities, I covered catering to the needs of a defined, lean-forward affinity group. Why not ask them for ideas and votes on what would make a compelling show for them? What would make them want to susbcribe? Just like Threadless has the "I'd Buy That" button, our show marketplace would have a "I'd Watch That"  and an "I'd Watch That Every Week" voting buttons. The principle is the same - prove there is an audience before going into costly production. What a great way to get marketers on board  before you have actually killed yourself bootstrapping production and building an audience.

Now lest you think I am slipping into the territory of the movie, The Player, where the studio exec decrys the need of writers by saying all we have to do is pick out a story from the paper and, "bam" there's our script, let me clarify. Let the crowd tell us what they would find compelling - what topics, what participants, what format - and then let the creative juices flow. We are not talking "exquisite corpse" here.

The biggest barrier to this model is likely to be "ego." Many show creators are trying to express an idea they are personally invested in. It's tough to become open to the audience. Beyond the poor quality of many videos, this issue - which can be called "control" - might be one of the larger barriers to success. Most filmmakers I know are passionate storytellers first. To win online, you must be passionate about your audience first. Diggnation seems to do a good job of this.

Next New Networks started with the promise of a hundred online shows for all sorts of audiences. They have quite a few today but more like 15 than a hundred. What would happen if married that ambition with a crowdsourced model? 

The Watchmen Marketing Juggernaut Heats Up!

"The world will look up and shout, "Save us!", and I'll whisper....no."

Last week I had the chance to meet with some of our sister companies inside WPP who were involved in the Facebook marketing for Watchmen. (First off, someone who should know says the movie is awesome). They have created 5 pages in facebook with fan pages for 4 of the characters including Rorschach. The pages have lots of goodies for fanboys like me from pics to movies to an app of questionable relevance to audio files and more. They have done a great job to fuel my appetite.

And then the nice folks at rubberrepublic.com sent me some goodies - videos - that I could post. I appreciate what they sent. Yesterday's video was from their small collection. I am a fan so this stuff is dead-on to my interests. This blog is rarely about those personal tastes as I save that for My Other Blog. But since this is a marketing juggernaut, I thought I would share.

What else could they have done?

• Given me audio files of Rorschach's signature "hurmmm"

• Let me belong to a movement to repeal the Keene Act (outlawing masked heroes)

• Given me a custom trailer that no one else had - all you would need is a custom scene or two

• A chance to win a prop (think of all those Battlestar props being auctioned off right now during the "final episodes")

• A chance to win a party of 25 tickets for opening day

• An application to assume the identity of a masked hero from the early days

It's as if they feel the artwork, scenes from the movie and behind the scenes video would be enough to get me to post and share....Okay, it worked. But I'm a fanboy.

How to Create the Next Video on the Web: Niche, Affinity Communities

 

This post is part of a 5-part series. How can we all be successful with the next wave of video on the Web whether you are a show producer or a brand? Connecting with niche, affinity communities is one of four important priorities.  

The vast "interwebs" has been potent fertilizer on an English garden-growth of niche communities online. We all belong to multiple tribes some of which are more clearly distinuishable and formal than others. We may love a particular music artist, a passion like WarHammer, a craft like t-shirt design, travel to Indonesian islands, or whetever. Some are tighter communities than others. Star Trek fans waiting for the next JJ Abram's movie are a tight group yet they also belong to a broader 'tribe' of Sci-fi fans who are known for their engagement with shows and events. That tribe intersects with the comic fan tribe who may be watching the Next New Networks Pulp Secret. "Crafting" is another "lean-forward" community with lots of enthusiasts assembled from even smaller niche interests.

Building a show that will uniquely deliver value to a particular affinity community almost guarantees a passionate audience. That audience may not be large enough to satisfy the True Show Value (the cost of quality, value to the audience and advertising value formula ) but it creates that solid core who will work as your most vocal ambassadors. The user and brand value of niche video shows has always been about the level of engagement of the participants. Tomorrow I will talk about why we shouldn't call them "audiences" anymore as a passive viewing experience is not what the niche community will thrive on.

Identifying Niche Communities

Finding niche communities and identifying their members is relatively simple. We do it everyday with our Influencer Mapping for brands. Let's say your brand - Brand G -  makes some type of super energy efficient home appliance that is really designed to address current concerns about energy consumption, cost, and environmental impact. One niche community is the design and sustainability crew which includes all sorts of designers - product designers, graphic designers, architects, furniture designers (many designers are multidisciplinary). Many of them are concerned and focused on sustainability through design. Huge Ven diagram overlap. Brand G would focus on designing a show and the marketing behind it to appeal to the design and sustainability crew. Then they would broaden it - adjust the content slightly and expanded the marketing and outreach to grow the audience amongst design-concious consumers. As an avid, lifelong reader of Metropolis magazine, I guarantee this magazine which covers design and architecture and its impact is read by a ton of non-designers and non-architects.

Make a video show that they want and need. It might be a regular survey of new consumer products that satisfy our new green priorities. It may include interviews with designers, including audience members about their own experiences. It might be a episodic "How to Make Your Life More Green" with step-by-step instructions on transforming your life or household to reduce your carbon footprint, your costs, and more.

So, start with a core community and design your show around their needs. Then expand the focus to include the next ring of participants. You won't go so far as to dilute the show's value for the core and you will expand beyond a too narrow group fo participants.     

Next: Work the "Ladder of Engagement"

Don't Support the Keene Act

It's been almost 32 years of the Keene Act. Next Friday it's time to bring it to an end!

How to Create the Next Video on the Web: 4 Priorities for Brands

I love video on the web. The part I like best is not watching "Dollhouse" on every platform under the sun from Fox to Hulu to iPhone (actually, I don't know if you can watch it on the iPhone or not). I like the diversity of the programming coming from young entrepeneurs like Zadi Diaz, new net networks like Revison3, blip.tv and Next New Networks, more personal efforts from tradiitonal "stars" like Will Farrell. Brands have a great opportunity to connect and engage via video on the Web either through partnering with content programmers - like TerraTV on blip.tv -  or becoming their own programmers. Either way, we need to adopt a new discipline to be successful with video going forward.

I just met with a group of tremendously creative show "creators" in LA who will launch a program online over the next few months. They have all been enmeshed in the entertainment business and they know where the business has been and suspect where it is going.  I love their passion, their show concept, and their smartness about making the business side work. I have a lot of heart for their project. Still , succeeding is complicated.

While there are some breakout successes like Seth MacFarlane's channel, most video shows on the Web follow the reverse hockey stick approach where the highly promoted first episode draws a big crowd followed by depressing fall off in episodes 2,3,4. This freefall leaves many programs struggling in the long, long tail. Video production has a threshold level of effort and cost that it cannot routinely dip below. We all want "quality." And while we may be willing to accept Flipcam video interviews and an occaissional clever video thrown together in the backyard by two brothers and a dog, we generally want quality represented by the thinking, creativity, and even production value of the show.

True Show Value

Challenge is that the cost of quality, value to the audience and advertising value formula has not really been cracked yet or cracked consistently enough to spell out a path to success.That is the True Show Value and every producer should know their formula before trying the sell their program.  This is broader than TubeMogul's formula for success which focuses mainly on the creation and distribution of the video and the metadata associated with it. These things are important and I presume most video producers online get this. Too many programs either struggle to build an appreciable audience (size + composition) or to define the value to the advertiser. "Sponsoring" a show that may reach 10,000 uniques of which you know so little about may not translate into a perceived value to the advertiser. I am choosing my words carefully because I believe marketing integration with great content provides great value, I just don't think everyone is great at demonstrating that value.

Many brands want to suceed by reaching their customers or their influencers via video. Brands are learning that they can succeed by becoming content creators and building relationships via that content. Consumer marketers want to create their own episodics that draw moms in for 6-12 epsiodes. B2B marketers want to build a long term relationship with buyers and opinion-formers of their services. How can brands succeed where dedicated video entrepeneurs themselves struggle?

Four Strategic Priorities

There are four strategic priorities that will help. each day this week, I will drill down into one of the four. They represent the disciplined thinking that we need in this next chapter of video on the Web. I believe niche, special interest shows will flourish and I believe brands will reap great value from being a part of or even outright creating their own shows that consumers will increasingly spend time with. One of the keys may be in letting the crowd within a commlunity tell us what they want in terms of programming. Stay tuned as I drill down into each as the week unfolds:

• Focus on the Value to Niche, Affinity Communities

• Work the "Ladder of Engagement"
• Idea Bar #12: Threadless Meets Next New Networks
• Design Creative Marketing Models

Word of Mouth Marketing Ninja University

On May 14th and 15th, we launch the second annual WOMM University (by the sea) and there are three things that I am totally excited about.

1. First of all, if you are a brand marketer and communications expert and want to sharpen your social media or WOMM skills to have the biggest impact possible, then sign up today. We developed the curriculum to give us all practical yet advanced skills. While we have great general sessions and brand cases, the best part is the small roundtables where you can work with peers and experts on activating brand evangelists, using social networks productively, SEO applied to social media, offline WOM, measurement and more.

2. Secondly, we will have a draft of WOMMA's Handbook to WOMM Measurement. Our Research and Measurement Council has been working on this practical guide for marketers based upon our continued work on performance and ROI measurement of social media and WOMM. The Handbook will be a great tool for all of us.

3. Third, but by no means last, is the productive networking that's built into this year's experience. Brand Council will have a beachside meetup. A very special sponsor is making another  beach Tweetup happen. Teresa has a few surprises that will make it fun and productive to network with other brands and WOMM experts.

My secret fourth reason is that I just figured out that Duncan Wardle from Disney is speaking. He  has great stories about fans becoming "cast members."      

Forget the social media "blog-a-thon" conferences. If you want to hone your strategic skills in social media, that's word of mouth marketing. Sign up today and use "fanofOgilvy" and get a discount.

BIGGER DISCOUNT TILL MARCH 2:

Use these codes when registering AND YOU WILL GET $200 off!:
WOMMA Members: memberB2S
Nonmembers: nonB2S

The Most Social Brands List Lacks Context

A few weeks ago, Vitrue, a small social media shop, delivered to the world their list of the "top social brands of 2008." It bothered me. The label confused some that this list indicated the brands using social media effectively. That's very much not what they mean. Their list represents the brands with the greatest share of voice across a variety of social media platforms including "social networking, blogging, microblogging, photo and video sharing sites."

Two things missing

There are tow useful pieces of information that would really be interesting and add meaning to marketers. The biggest one is "why" are people talking about them. The context of 'why' is where any true insight can come. Just spot check the list with my hypothesis for "why" and you will see what I mean:

No.	Brand	Why?
1	iPhone	Truly disruptive innovation
2	CNN	Highly referenced news site in an election year
6	Starbucks	Financial trouble; supporters and detractors online
10	Dell	Lots of good social activity + financials
31	GM	Financial trouble

There's nothing wrong about wanting to be amongst the most "talked about" brands in social media. but the reasons why matter more than sheer volume.

Second Reason

The second question that crossed my mind (actually, it was JP Maheu's mind that thought to do this) was how this list compares with brand value. Jennifer Jamieson at Ogilvy was nice enough to compare the Interbrand list of most valuable brands and the "top social brands" list. As you can see below from an excerpt there is no corelations at this point. How should we value the list of "social brands?" What is the true significance of this list? 

Brand	Interbrand Best Global Brands 2008 Ranking	Virtue 100 Social Brand 2008 Ranking
Coca-Cola	1	22
IBM	2	77
Microsoft	3	11
GE	4	33
Nokia	5	-
Toyota	6	48
Intel	7	76
McDonald's	8	32
Disney	9	4
Google	10	-
Mercedes-Benz	11	36
Hewlett-Packard	12	18
BMW	13	37
Gillette	14	-
American Express	15	-
Louis Vuitton	16	-
Cisco	17	80
Marlboro	18	-
Citi	19	-
Honda	20	25

 

An OfficeMax Social Media Lesson

I am not a big fan of quirky game or activity microsites that brands put together as an alternative to advertising. Too many advertising-driven marketers turn to this form of 'branded entertainment' first as it seems like a natural extension of the stroy-telling capacity fo their ad agencies of advertising leadership. Traffic to microsites feels as good as ad impressions, etc.. But they can play an important role and be hugely popular which can be helpful to the brand.

OfficeMax's Elf Yourself is hugely popular. They have done it for three years running. I laughed my you-know-what off when I saw Christine Cea and her band of marcom execs from Unilever "Elf" themselves at our WOMM workshop in December. (This past year's effort was powered by JibJab - check out Random Culture's coverage) By December 13th 2008, AdRants reported these figures:

• ElfYourself.com has served over 65 million visitors thus far
• Over 41 million elves have been made since mid-November*
• 35 new elves are created per second
• The average time people spend on Elf Yourself is equivalent to 800 years (based on total site visits times average time per visit)

In this past week's Business Week, Bob Thacker, SVP of marcom at OfficeMax, talked about competing with Staples and teh like when their ad budgets outweigh his measly $15m (that's just their newspaper spend). And while the holiday time is a high revenue time for them, the ad clutter out there is dense and immovable. So, did he charge his agency with creating the cut and paste cut-up, Elf Yourself? No. 

Experiment Broadly and Concurrently

He asked his team to create 20 different, holiday-themed microsites. many fell by the way-side. Elf Yourself took-off. that experimental approach is key to suceeding today. The days of researching adn "cathedral-building" a campaign must die. No one, no expert of any kind, knows exactly what will work especially when it comes to this narrow world of "viral campaigns.' The best professional advice is to poise yourself for experiments and be ready to dial up the effective ones. And time, 'she's-a-wastin.' Do a few things at once or in a short period of time. No one has the stamina for 6 months of testing what might work.

This is a big shift. Many ad agencies have either a creative or planner-dominated culture. Both can be 'cathedral-builders.' And the best of them are great salespeople on the brand value of cathedral building. They can really suck you in.  

Stay nimble. Try things. Be willing to be imperfect. Measure everyday. Make a change up when something doesn't work (and know when you need to commit more energy and effort to prove out the model, too). That's what I have learned form this example and many others.

The Next Experiment

Now that Officemax has a perennial winner with Elf Yourself, will they continue to apply the experimental approach to find the next marcom approach that works? Will they dive into utility in addition to entertainment?

(thanks to xcaballe on FlickR for the EflYourself CC image)

Davos 09 - Where's the Digital Experience?

I realized that the World Economic Forum Davos conference was happening this past week when I read Michael Arrington's "spit post" last week. All week, I had been meaning to ap into the social media side of the event yet just didn't have time. Like last year, I was able to tap into their "Social Media" page and choose between their YouTube pages, their Twitter feed, Netvibes, Flickr, Qik, Mogulus, MySpace, Facebook page, their own video player page and more.

Need to Add "Guides"

With all of this availble content, I need a guide. I want to find all the content related to digital innovation. Could be a series of human guides that offer their 'playlist' of content. Could be a series of segmented tags that the crowd attending and creating content would use. Where's the Davos Delicious page? (I would have guessed "davos2009" as a good, all-purpose tag but there are only 12 tags there). Clearly there is a lot of traditoinal media coverage from FT.com and Time.com. I particularly like the page and coverage from the Huffington post. They serve as guides for the readers who have a close affinity for their editorial focus.  I am particularly interested in sessions and discussions about the impact and trends of "digital."

I am confident that I could piece this together and create a "guide" to digital-related issues/sessions/content. Since the WEC has done such a great job with getting digital content up there, the next step could be creating these effective "guides" - tools, people, data - that makes teh experience more naigable and relevant to more people.

Good Digital Session: The Next Digital Experience

Here is a decent session hosted by Michael Arrington with some of the usual "young founders" talking at first about mobile and then wandering around the innovations brought about by YouTube, Facebook, and, finally issues like privacy. Participants: Hamid Akhavan, Eric K. Clemons, Chad Hurley, Craig Mundie, Shantanu Narayen, Mark Zuckerberg. The session runs like a standard panel - they don't dip into questions from online, Twitter, et al. Good stuff in there and worth having on in the background.

tidbits:

Mark Zuckerberg - "People are becoming more and more comfortable sharing more..."

Eric K. Clemons (Wharton) - "My good friend, Jason Lanier, who pioneered virtual reality says that is so "last year." What we want is augmented reality..." where we get more information layered in on our lives.

Eric K. Clemons - "...Us, old guys, we  are not hiding from data we are hiding from push...which is a big problem for (marketers)..."