LB's Rambles

Service Counts

I've written before about the information age dangers of providing bad service. At the risk of boring you, however, let me back my opinions up with some new statistics, courtesy of eMarketer. They say that more than 70% of US Internet users use social media at least sometimes BEFORE making a purchase, to find out what kind of customer service a company provides. According to eMarketer, "More than nine out of 10 respondents agreed with the statement, 'I have chosen companies/brands based on my customer care experiences.'"

Bottom line to would-be marketers, once again: if you're relying on advertising and PR to build your brand, and you're ignoring your customer service, you are in for serious disappointment.

Twitter: Maybe It's Not Just Me

An interesting, and rather surprising, story today in the Online Media Daily tells me - as the headline has it - that "Twitter Hasn't Reached Mainstream."  The story cites some new statistics from Hitwise Intelligence that place Twitter #439 among all social networks and forums.

OK. Maybe I'm going to reveal my total un-coolness here. But that "mainstream" would include me, I fear.

I use Twitter, but I do so with the definite feeling that I don't quite, you know, get it. Now I don't use it (or want it) on my mobile phone, for example. I follow the service on my desktop where I do most of my work and on my laptop.

But I don't follow that many people and don't have that many following me. I have enough trouble keeping up with the few people that I do follow, some of whom appear to hit the send key on virtually any pretext. Sometimes the notes are interesting; too often, I fear, they're boring. Or drivel. The same may be said - absolutely and with an emphasis on the "drivel" - of my own tweets.

I suppose it's because I'm not using my mobile phone to track this stuff. I suppose that multi-platform and super-mobile ability is what sets Twitter apart. It's just that I can't see a whole lot of use for it, at least not for me personally.

But then, it took me a while to warm to Facebook. Maybe I'm not completely ineducable. Just too mainstream, for now at least, to give Twitter its due.

Help a Reporter Out

The following is a note from Peter Shankman about a free resource that every PR person and journalist should know about.

Sharing with you today a great resource.  You'll want to tell the PR people, marketers, publicists, editors, and journalists you work with about it too, because it's all about them and their needs. 

If you're not already using www.helpareporter.com, check it out.  It's a service much like ProfNet, but free.  It used to be on Facebook, but grew too large for it.  Once you subscribe, you receive about three (sometimes two, no more than four, ever) emails a day with reporter, editor and freelance writer queries, written so you can quickly and easily scan the topics for relevance. 

If the topics do not apply to you or your clients, just hit delete. If they do, you may contact the reporter or editor directly, as instructed.

Note that Peter Shankman, the list facilitator, is very strict about helping out these reporters.  Respond only if your information (or your client's info) is relevant and on target.  If not, you'll get bumped off the list.  Quickly.  I've seen it happen. He's a big believer in good Karma, and he's also quite funny, and tends to also include a link to a fun site, or a funny story about his day in the emails. It's a nice refreshing change from the boring, non-funny emails we usually deal with.

Reporters can post queries at www.helpareporter.com/press, and sources can sign up at www.helpareporter.com - As I said, it's free. Peter asks that if you find it useful, then you make a donation to any animal rescue charity or animal hospital.

You can forward the queries to others who are a fit, but do not post any queries (or the editor/reporter contact info) on any blogs or public websites.  I received permission from Peter to send you this note, since this is a private group and I'm helping to spread the word to both subscribers and media to sign up.

www.helpareporter.com - The more people who use it, the better it becomes.

"A Country of Voyeurs"

That's the assessment of Americans - at least when it comes to social media - from David Cohen, theU. S. director of digital communications at Universal McCann. He's reacting to a new study done by his company, as reported in AdWeek, that finds the U. S. running behind South America and Asia when it comes to people who create social media.

According to the study, Americans tend to be passive participants on social networks. They're interested in watching videos online, and a fair number of them read blogs. But when it comes to actually creating the social media, actually blogging, even setting up video and photo sharing, Americans tend to lag behind.

"We love to watch and consumer content created by others," says Cohen, "but there's a fairly small group that are doing that creation - unlike China, which is a country of creators."

Hat tip: Online Media Daily

The Perils of Paying for PageViews

Mark Glaser has a thoughtful post over on the MediaShift blog explaining why he thinks it's a bad idea to pay bloggers based on the raw page views for their posts. That's a system that appears to have been adopted by Blogmeister Nick Denton, who makes it clear that he wants big raw numbers for the Gawker Media blogs he backs - or else.

Glaser argues, however, that going after the raw page view numbers may be a poor strategy for attracting both readers and advertisers:

I believe that a blog with 50,000 loyal, repeat visitors is much more valuable to the publisher, advertisers — everyone on the business side — than a blog that has sensational posts that bring in 100,000 one-time visitors for entertainment snacks who are then gone the next moment. You hear everyone talking about the Long Tail, the ability to serve niches online, and the importance of audience engagement and time spent on a site more than sheer page views and traffic per month.

There's more, and there's a lot of thoughtful discussion in the comments as well - definitely worth your time to read and to ponder. I think his point is a valid one - and of particular interest, as we all struggle with defining meaningful measurement for our online products.

Podcasting Standards

As promised, the Association for Downloadable Media has developed two sets of guidelines for podcasting. One document deals with advertising standards, defining and outlining the kinds of ads that may be available on any particular podcast. The other tries to define standards for the kinds of audience and performance measurement that may be available.

The guidelines were rolled out today at AdTech, in San Francisco, and the idea is to gather comments from as many people as possible inside and outside of advertising and podcasting. The documents are open for comment for 30 days, after which they will be refined, based on the comments and suggestions received. Take a look and please do comment.

Deadly Blogging

In what is unintentionally one of the funniest articles I've read so far this year, the New York Times weighs in on the terrible and deadly toll taken among...bloggers.

That's right, the stress under which we poor souls are laboring is killing us off at a massive rate. Why, the Times cites the case of two - TWO! - bloggers who died of heart attacks in the past, um, four months. A quagmire!

After several paragraphs about the killing stress that apparently has been taking such a heavy toll among bloggers, the author does have the grace to note:

To be sure, there is no official diagnosis of death by blogging, and the premature demise of two people obviously does not qualify as an epidemic. There is also no certainty that the stress of the work contributed to their deaths. But friends and family of the deceased, and fellow information workers, say those deaths have them thinking about the dangers of their work style.

(I'll wait while you stop laughing.)

Seems to me as if we've just knocked down the premise of the story, right?

Look, most of us blog because we like blogging. And it tends to relieve stress. It can even give us a chance to vent.

But I will admit that I'm careful not to let my life insurance lapse...

You Take the Fame, I'll Take the Cash

Let's face it: blogging and podcasting can be fun - they can also be a lot of work - but at least some bloggers and podcasters are building up an audience and a reputation, at least in the online world. What very few of them are building up, however, is cash.

Tim Bourquin, the principal mover behind the annual New Media Expo, doesn't think much of the tradeoff. In a blog post called "Internet Famous, Dirt Poor," he argues that we really do need to find a way to monetize both blogging and podcasting.

There's a pretty lively discussion going on in reaction to that posting. But may I point out the work in this area of an organization I've mentioned before, the Association for Downloadable Media. They will be releasing some proposed advertising standards and measurement guidelines within the next two weeks at the big ad:tech conference in San Francisco. All of this is by way of participating in a debate and conversation that needs to happen if blogging and podcasting are to move beyond being an enjoyable and interesting hobby - as I think they will.

No No, Mustn't Look There

How to blow a good PR move: the Denver Airport recently began providing free Wi-Fi services to people passing through the facility. And then, like idiots, they decided to restrict access to sites which some bureaucratic nanny feared might prove too "provocative." Like Vanity Fair. And boingboing.

According to Bulldog Reporter's Daily Dog, "the airport would rather deal with infrequent complaints about access than handle angry parents whose children might see pornography. Airport officials say they're using prudent judgment in a public, family–friendly atmosphere." Right.

The illogic is depressing. Children, apparently, are more likely to view pornography on their computers if they are hooked up to free Wi-Fi rather than Wi-Fi for which their parents must pay? Parents won't look to see what their children are viewing if they don't have to pay for it? I fail to understand. And the result is to make Denver, which set out to do something smart and cool and hip by providing free Wi-Fi, look really bad instead. That's the beauty of this kind of petty censorship - it smears everyone and everything it touches.

Transient Communities

Steve Rubel, at Micro Persuasion, takes a thoughtful look at the constantly changing face of the communities we build on the Internet:

On the Internet, churn is constant.

Historically, online communities have perpetually come and go. The Internet Archive amber is littered with fossilized communities that once dominated, much the way the T-Rex roamed during the Mesozoic era. These include former stalwarts such as Angelfire, The Well, TheGlobe.com, GeoCities, Tripod and Friendster.

Rubel goes on to predict that social networks will evolve from a loose network of discrete sites into a kind of river that flows through the Internet.

He could be right - although I agree with  commenter David Binkowski on Rubel's site who observed that there is a necessary difference "between communities meaning 'those driven by specific web sites or technologies' and communities meaning people. There are a lot of communities still around from the 1990's; whether they use the next big social media platform to communicate, are still using message boards or have moved from URL to URL, the platform isn't what makes the community. In fact, it's exactly the opposite."

Trying to get a fix on the social web is like trying to nail Jello to the wall. That's as true from a business perspective as it is from a personal or social one. We're not yet at the point where Rubel's "river" exists - there are too many individual networks that won't play nice - but it's coming. But behind the technology - ALWAYS - are the same people, interacting, moving on. That's the challenge and the opportunity.