Digital Hive

2011 trends - at least one view on what's coming

Thanks to Greg Verdino (Crayon's Chief Strategy Officer) for a great post about a new book that we should all be checking out - -- 2011: Trendspotting for the Next Decade by Richard Laermer, author of Trendspotting, Punk Marketing and the mastermind behind the Bad Pitch Blog. Richard is also the world's fastest thumb typist, and claims to have composed this entire work on Blackberries.

What's fantastic is you can get an electronic edition of the book forfree right by visiting FreeBabyFree. My first time doing this but so far so good.

I am only beginning to plow through it but it's already proving an interesting read -snackable, pithy and chock full of pop culture references. Highly consistent with what our friends at Yankelovich are seeing in their data, but fun to think about from a different perspective.

I particularly enjoyed his observation that flexibility will be king by 2011 - semper Gumby.

And the whole e-book experience is pretty fun too.

BTW Greg, I hope you don't mind, I am putting your photo up on my fridge at home. Actually I think I'll have it printed on a magnet so then I can move it around the house at will. Oh and sometimes bring it to work too, but only on Fridays. We miss you!

If you want insights, you'll have to unclench

The always brilliant (and incredibly adorable) Alina Koyfman shared a fantastic New Yorker piece about where insights come from (download it below). In it writer Jonah Lehrer consults the leading scientists in the field and learns some startling, helpful things.

Most interesting to me: "the insight process is an act of cognitive deliberation - the brain must be focused on the task at hand - transformed by accidental, serendipitous connection. We must concentrate, but we must concentrate on letting the mind wander."

I particularly enjoyed the reference to my favorite contemporary physicist, Richard Feynman, "who preferred the relaxed atmosphere of a topless bar where he would sip 7UP, watch the entertainment, and, if inspiration struck, scribble equations on cocktail napkins." (NOTE: it's not clear whether Feynman himself was topless or just the entertainers)

Lehrer at one point observes that the "clenched state of mind may inihibit the sort of creative connections that lead to insight breakthroughs." Particularly in today's economically challenging times where clients are cutting budgets and expecting us to do more with less, I think it's critical to learn how to unclench your mind, and unclench the minds of your team-mates. It's only when we're all unclenched that we can wander optimally to the biggest idea.

Download lehrer_insight_new_yorker1.pdf

Get back in the closet

Or wardrobe, to be more precise. Adverblog introduced me to a wicked cool new Ikea online experience that demonstrates the functionality of its Pax closet line in a really entertaining way. Remember we're talking about closets, people. I believe closets are below toilet paper and paper clips in consumer interest.

It's basically a series of vignettes of people in their bedrooms or "closet rooms." You give them tasks to do that involve the Pax products in their homes(e.g., putting on a hat or shoes or choosing pants or a dress). You can even use a microphone to make the characters move to your voice.

My favorite vignette features Mexican wrestling looking characters (Kim Snow, are you reading this?).

It does have a surreal, engaging, what's-going-to-happen-next Uniqlock-ish quality to it, but I still like it a lot. As a reminder, here's the Cannes-winning Uniqlo work:

Maybe I like both because I am fans of the products of both. Or maybe it's that positive energy seems to pour forth from both. Having these interactive experiences is kind of like mainlining sunshine in my book. And the world needs that right now, I think.

Planning at 40: what's next for us?

JWT London recently hosted a conference about the future of planning - to commemorate our craft's 40th anniversary. Luminaries including Jon Steel, Guy Murphy (JWT's global planning head), John Grant, Jeremy Bullmore, and Alison Burns (JWT's fantastic London office leader) offer inspiring thoughts about where planning is and should be headed in its next 40 years.

Jon Steel's video is posted below, visit the conference site to see others and read speech transcripts or visit the conference blog.

I wholeheartedly agree with Jon Steel's point that planning has become too soft, inadequately informed by strategic inputs - and join with him in encouraging us all to strive for the goal of inspiring "grounded creative."

Jon Steel: Planning at 40: Solving the wrong problems from JWT on Vimeo.

In person WOM - more credible by definition?

That Jackie Huba is on FIRE, people. Loving this post about some recent WOM research she uncovered.

Jackie quotes Brad Fay who recently wrote that there's something about in-person communication that boosts its credibility - but she adds that there is a "frame of credibility. Being credible isn't dependent solely upon the medium in which a recommendation occurs. Credibility comes from an established position of trust, whether it's in-person or online, or from a preponderance of independent evidence, such as a collection of reviews on a product site like Amazon."

Wholeheartedly agree, Jackie. If you don't trust someone, the channel of interaction doesn't matter.

I think it's easy for brands to lose sight of this when developing marketing programs - it's easy to think hey if we put an able bodied person out there on the street handing stuff out or talking up our new product people will just eat it up because it's a real person providing a POV. But without the establishment of credibility, it's easy to dismiss it all as noise.

There are also some good comments cueing up the current debate on this topic, as well as interesting data from recent Keller Fay research (hey Ed & Brad, love you guys). Check it out!

A new vision for how research can contribute

Last week I had the great pleasure of participating in a day-long ARF panel discussion about how social media is transforming brands' ability to "listen" to consumers.

There were many luminaries in attendance (e.g., Pete Blackshaw, Ed Keller, David Rabjohns, Lynd Bacon, Kim Dedeker from P&G, Josh Chasin from ComScore, Donna Goldfarb from Unilever, Gayle Fuguitt from General Mills, Ann Green from Millward Brown, etc.).

Here's the deck I shared to stimulate thoughts, it highlights a Communispace white paper Diane Hessan shared that I found very interesting:

Download arf_07152008.ppt

We had a day of spirited discussion about how social media transforms the nature of listening and really raises the bar on how consumers will expect companies/brands to behave. We had a big discussion around how we need to pivot from focus on "brand's back yard" to focus on "consumer's back yard" - meaning, developing a broad understanding of what's important to consumers BEYOND the brand or product you're marketing. An obvious point for agency folks but still new for many brand marketers, I think.

The breakout group I was part of (along with David Rabjohns, Gayle Fuguitt, Josh Chasin and Bob Barocci - who runs ARF) came up with the attached vision (click to enlarge photo above) for how the research function (inspired and enabled by social media) can add more value to the enterprise by being a catalyst for growth, not just a downstream evaluator of ideas (that's what we meant by "validation purgatory"). Moving upstream was a key theme all acknowledged - specifically drawing a tighter connection between research and upstream ideation, as pulling in-market results into a feedback loop that drives program iteration.

An inspiring and energetic session which I hope will help inspire the research industry to develop new strategies and offerings, as well as offer diverse career and development paths to research practitioners who want them.

ARF (under leadeship of Joel Rubinson, chief research officer) will continue to push this topic over coming months, via white papers, etc. Look for it!

Couldn't resist sharing this pic of Gayle Fuguitt with her trademark blue pen, which got her into a lot of trouble with David Rabjohns.

Branded content that's on brand

Thanks to the fabulous Francis Anderson for a great blog post about an interesting Unilever/MindShare brand content partnership (with contributions from Fox) that supports the Degree deodorant brand -it's called The Rookie.

Shot by 24's director of photography, the experience has shades of Jack Bauer and features a protagonist (Jason Blaine) whose protection is so strong he never perspires (a great fit with the Degree brand's positioning; indeed in the section about the product Degree proudly proclaims this is its most over-engineered product ever, shades of 24 indeed).

Francis reports 1.44 Million visitors so far but an average visit length of 5 minutes, which is decent.

Interestingly, you can also access old 24 episodes on the site(from Jack Bauer's "rookie season").

Digital WOM is important - just a reminder

A great post from Church of the Customer corroborating what we already know, that online WOM is a big influencer of consumer purchase decisions.

According to a recent Opinion Research Corp study, 61% of respondents check review sites, blogs and other customer feedback forums before buying a new product or service.

Not earth shattering news for those of us in the social media trenches, but Ben O'Connell puts an interesting spin on it: this means 1% of your customers could be influencing 61% of your prospects.

Another reminder that WOM is important and those who ignore it might pay the price.