- Ideas on Marketing, Design, and Technology from Digital Strategist Matt J McDonald
Wow this is great stuff.
One thing this got me thinking about was the fact that to be “social” doesn’t necessarily mean you have to tweet or have a Facebook page. If you offer services or technology that works with, augments, or improves inherent social behavior, you can have more of an effect than any number of tweeted links.
…is an increasingly dumb distinction.
Inspired by this tweet from Paul Isakson, which was inspired by this piece from Ad Age, I got to thinking about the general concept of ideas and executions. Paul says “ideas are ideas” and I’m inclined to agree.
So many times, ideas get pegged as Online or Offline and then executed independently. The problem with this is that it’s not how people operate. My online life might be more tied to my offline life than the average person, but just look at how many people are active on Facebook (250 million!), not to mention Twitter, Blogs, and e-mail. People don’t consciously think “this is an online action” and “this is an offline action”. A social action is social, it doesn’t matter if its a tweet, text message, or lunch plans.
The fact that many companies have different agencies for online and offline efforts certainly doesn’t help, but that’s a poor excuse. If the best ideas and efforts really tap into the markets behavior, then why do we still insist on segregating ideas. If the left hand doesn’t know what the right hand is doing, it makes it really easy to get punched in the face.
Every once in a while, I come up with an idea that I can’t really execute (at least by myself). In those cases, why let the idea just go away when I can put it out there and see if someone can run with it.
Synopsis: Thunderheads is an online brainstorming tool designed to facilitate easy collaboration for both local and remote teams.
Background: With all the work being done remotely, across town and across the world, I was looking for a way to capture the spirit of brainstorming, but over the web. Thunderheads would be as close as you can get to “getting people in a room” together and working on possibilities via the web.
Features: Thunderheads would be comprised of 4 main areas, shown in the (really rough) mock-up below.
1) Brainstorming Window - This is the blank canvas, participants would be able to draw and type in addition to dropping in photos, videos, or sound clips. By making this a collaborative environment, it enables people to show what they’re thinking in various different mediums. Plus it’s great for doodling.
2) Team Video Chat - Webcam equipped participants will be able to use full video capabilities, which is better for interaction, and is way more fun. Also, you can see my sessions is with Albert Einstein, muppet Bunsen Honeydew and Phillies manager Charlie Manuel. That’s a brain trust right there people.
3) Inspirations - This is where team members can link, upload, or post any materials that might be inspiring for the challenge at hand. Poem by Frost? Sure. Music videos from Youtube? Go for it. Whatever gets the fire going.
4) Keepers - This section is where you can place any of the more formed and finished ideas. Good for takeaways and getting ready to move on to the next steps. The fruits of your labor.
That’s about as far as I got on this one. What do you think? Anyone want to actually make this?
1) Facebook and Twitter are like hammers and screwdrivers. We need less posts/books on how to swing a hammer and more on how to build a house.
2) User Experience Design is both extremely intriguing and intimidating at the same time. While most types of design are concrete and finite, i.e. a the Mona Lisa is always going to look like that, UX is inherently transient and ephemeral. It’s the only type of design that re-invents itself with each experience or user.
3) We need to be careful to not turn social media into celebrity endorsements. I know the point is to “Influence the Influencers”, but when you give those people wild perks/free stuff, it doesn’t do anything for me. So some A-Lister liked their free meal? Where’s the connection? Why not spend that money and give all their readers a $5 coupon?
4) The only way to not be lumped in with spammers/auto-dm’ers/shady practitioners and others that give marketers a “bad name” is to go out of your way to make a good name for yourself. Be known for not only preaching the right thing, but for following through and doing the right thing too. Show people that you’re above all the crap that brings “us” down.
The amount of events that are being live-tweeted is steadily rising, although it was a fairly common practice with the early adopters/nerds back in the day. Now, you’ll find people live tweeting church, surgeries, births, all kinds of wild stuff. While I completely support everyone’s right to share whats going on, I’m not as much of a fan as I used to be.
First off, it’s really hard to coherently follow someone who is live tweeting a speaker or a series of speakers. Like many of you, I have a lot of action in my feed. If you’re following hundreds/thousands of people, despite being hashtagged, there’s no sense of continuity. It get’s lost in the stream.
Piggybacking on that point is the fact that I don’t think live-tweeting does the event justice. There’s no context, no visuals (which good presos usually incorporate), no completeness. I think there’s so much more to these presentations, and while I’m grateful for the quotable nuggets that people pull out, it doesn’t really illuminate much.
But that’s just me. How do you feel about the whole thing?
But that’s just me. How do you feel about this stuff? What’s your take on the shifting focus of a blog? How have you grown changed as an author or a reader?
Fire away.
Another idea spurred by that Clay Shirky post I mentioned a little while ago.
I think a big takeaway here is that we have to be careful when we look for or label something “revolutionary”. Mainly because if something really is revolutionary, then it’s definitely going to screw things up, at least for a little bit. Who could have ever guessed we’d end up at 1, 2, or even (gasp!) 3, when we’ve been so used to A, B, and C?
Also, many times people don’t even want something revolutionary. They’re okay with just better, faster, stronger (resisting the pull to link to that Kanye song…didn’t work) and don’t need a game changer.
Be careful when you’re blowing minds.
My name is Matt J McDonald and I'm a New Marketing Strategist based in Charleston, SC.
Recent Comments