RE: Inventing Email

Very cool to see Chad inspired by my Email is Killing Your Business article (http://su.pr/3XymN9) to sketch his own solutions:

chadhietala:

Lets face it, email sucks as it is known today.  While valiant efforts are being made by Google to re-invent online communication, the fact remains that there is a large user base of desktop based email clients.  The problem with email is that it’s very top down, meaning that forces it’s self on you.  It’s not natural.  Emails get lost because of this.

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Source: chadhietala

Very nice of Craig to include me on this impressive list of panel proposals for SXSW. By all means, give it a look! Thanks again Craig. Speaking at C+M still one of my highlights this year. craigpladson: SXSW 2010 will be here before we know it and the panel picker process for the event has already begun (and ends this coming Friday 9/2). While I encourage you to vote for Colle+McVoy’s two proposed panel topics, the focus here is what panels I recommend voting for. Check out the three below and let me know what you think. What are your favorite panel topics for SXSW? How Screenwriting and Film Theory Creates Enchanting Websites Michael Leis came to speak at C+M last December and gave a similar presentation. He is an amazing presenter and the content is second-to-none. Practical Digital Anthropology: Getting to Know Your Users I work closely with Account Planning and appreciate the idea of “digital anthropology.” Will be especially interesting with a social media tie-in. Turning a Real-Life Event Into an Online Experience I love the idea of sharing free information on the Web. Since I’m working on how C+M can do this better, the TED panel should be spot-on.
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Very nice of Craig to include me on this impressive list of panel proposals for SXSW. By all means, give it a look!

Thanks again Craig. Speaking at C+M still one of my highlights this year.

craigpladson:

SXSW 2010 will be here before we know it and the panel picker process for the event has already begun (and ends this coming Friday 9/2). While I encourage you to vote for Colle+McVoy’s two proposed panel topics, the focus here is what panels I recommend voting for. Check out the three below and let me know what you think. What are your favorite panel topics for SXSW?

  1. How Screenwriting and Film Theory Creates Enchanting Websites

    Michael Leis came to speak at C+M last December and gave a similar presentation. He is an amazing presenter and the content is second-to-none.

  2. Practical Digital Anthropology: Getting to Know Your Users

    I work closely with Account Planning and appreciate the idea of “digital anthropology.” Will be especially interesting with a social media tie-in.

  3. Turning a Real-Life Event Into an Online Experience

    I love the idea of sharing free information on the Web. Since I’m working on how C+M can do this better, the TED panel should be spot-on.

The brand hub-and-spoke coming together

Although many people have talked about the branded hub, or microsite being dead, I think it’s moving in a new, more valuable space as curator of the many spokes that a company must have out there to reach out on the Web and mobile devices.

The brands that are reaching out now need a place to curate this effort. I liken it to sewing: where putting the needle through the fabric one way (social and distributed channels) is one part of the stitch.

But now you have to come back through, integrate these technologies and complete the stitch — the information they represent about the brand, the people who interact with the brand (both internally and externally) — back into a context that is owned by the brand.

Ken Burnaby did a great job collecting (along with the readers) a number of large brand sites that are already making headway in actively, programmatically, making the brand site a hub of all their online activity.

No, this still isn’t a place where troves of people are going to visit, though I think you’d be surprised at how many do. But strategically it can be incredibly important and valuable for the brand.

Proof

Both brand proof “look at what we’re doing” and social proof “look at the people at our company and among our customers who are taking part in the cause of our brand.” Now the brand site can really be a living reflection of the work.

What’s next

A big problem in many campaigns is that they only allow for so much interaction. With a hub, you can give a user in any social or distributed network an easy “next step” into discovering (and you can’t underestimate the power of discovery), what other content you have to offer, and where else they can have access to it.

Acknowledging the brand as software developer

It’s all really about the fact that the old addage of “We’re not in the [enter technology here] business.” Which continues to linger in brands that need to start really taking on and developing software solutions, online or on the desktop. But that’s like saying that coke isn’t in the vending machine business, or the trucking business.

Software design and development is a logistical expense for communicating effectively and evocatively with an audience. It’s not going away, and I don’t think it’s an expense that can be carried forever from marketing or PR: two industries not known for taking on these deeper kinds of endeavors.

More to come on this, just wanted to get these initial thoughts down.

Now here’s a competetive difference: while everyone else is trying to jazz-up water, we’re gonna zag and really own the “just plain water” market. It’s huge! Everybody needs it!
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Now here’s a competetive difference: while everyone else is trying to jazz-up water, we’re gonna zag and really own the “just plain water” market. It’s huge! Everybody needs it!